UPDATE 1-Russia presses Germany for more detail on Navalny, urges 'transparency'
MOSCOW, Sept 4- The Kremlin said on Friday that it wanted dialogue with Germany over the case of opposition politician Alexei Navalny and that Russian doctors who treated him initially were much more transparent than the German doctors treating him now. Germany, where Navalny is in hospital, has said he was poisoned with a Soviet-style Novichok nerve agent and…
MOSCOW, Sept 4 (Reuters) – The Kremlin said on Friday that
it wanted dialogue with Germany over the case of opposition
politician Alexei Navalny and that Russian doctors who treated
him initially were much more transparent than the German doctors
treating him now.
Germany, where Navalny is in hospital, has said he waspoisoned with a Soviet-style Novichok nerve agent and wants theperpetrators held to account. Russia has until now not opened acriminal investigation and said there is no evidence yet of acrime.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow wanted to findout from Germany what exact substance caused Navalny to fall illin Siberia last month.
“According to the version of our doctors it wasn’t apoisoning,” Peskov said. “The German specialists managed toestablish some kind of poisonous substance. We’re counting on adialogue with our German colleagues.”
He added: “Investigative actions are being carried out byour specialists, and if there is confirmation of the presence ofpoisonous substances in the biological material of the patient(Navalny), then of course legal consequences will follow. We askeveryone to rely on the facts.”
Navalny is the most popular and prominent opponent ofPresident Vladimir Putin, and the German announcement this weekthat he was poisoned by a nerve agent has raised the possibilityof further Western sanctions against Moscow.
Separately, a Russian court said on Friday it had rejected acomplaint filed by allies of Navalny accusing a top lawenforcement body of inaction over what they said was hisattempted murder.
One of Navalny’s allies accused the Investigative Committee,which handles probes into major crimes, of inaction following astatement they filed to it on Aug. 20 demanding a criminalinvestigation be opened into Navalny’s attempted murder.
The court said the Investigative Committee had passed on thestatement by Navalny’s supporters to one of its regionalbranches in Siberia and asked for it to be reviewed.
Kira Yarmysh, Navalny’s spokeswoman, said the court had saidtheir statement had been treated as a “citizen’s appeal”, alegal nuance she said meant it could take up to 30 days for itbe looked at.
“Anything so they don’t have to start an investigation,” shewrote on Twitter.(Reporting by Elena Fabrichnaya, Anton Kolodyazhnyy and MariaVasilyeva; writing by Tom Balmforth and Mark Trevelyan, Editingby William Maclean)