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POISONING

Russian opposition leader ‘can walk with a tremble’ after Berlin treatment

Russia's leading opposition politician Alexei Navalny announced on Saturday that he could now walk with a "tremble", and gave the first detailed account of his recovery nearly a month after being poisoned.

Russian opposition leader 'can walk with a tremble' after Berlin treatment
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny published a photograph of him walking down stairs. Photo: Instagram account of Alexey Navalney
The 44-year-old Kremlin critic posted a photo of himself walking downstairs on Instagram and described how earlier symptoms had included the inability to form words.
   
“Now I am a guy whose legs tremble when he takes the stairs,” he wrote, detailing moments of “despair” as doctors help him overcome the effects of the nerve agent Novichok.
   
This latest update on his progress came after posted to Instagram on Tuesday that he had spent a first day breathing unassisted.
   
The anti-corruption campaigner fell ill on a plane from Siberia to Moscow on August 20 and spent two days in a Russian hospital before being airlifted to Berlin's Charite hospital.
   
Navalny said in his update that during the initial days of his recovery, he had needed therapy to help him recover his speech as he struggled to form words.
   
He was still unable to use a phone, he added, meaning friends or family probably posted the messages for him.
 
 

 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 

 
 
 

Давайте расскажу, как идёт мое восстановление. Это уже ясная дорога, хоть и неблизкая. Все текущие проблемы вроде того, что телефон в моих руках бесполезен, как камень, а налить себе водички превращается в целый аттракцион, – сущая ерунда. Объясню. Совсем недавно я не узнавал людей и не понимал, как разговаривать. Каждое утро ко мне приходил доктор и говорил: Алексей, я принёс доску, давайте придумаем, какое на ней написать слово. Это приводило меня в отчаяние, потому что хоть я уже и понимал в целом, что хочет доктор, но не понимал, где брать слова. В каком месте головы они возникают? Где найти слово и как сделать так, чтобы оно что-то означало? Все это было решительно непонятно. Впрочем, как выразить своё отчаяние, я тоже не знал и поэтому просто молчал. И это я еще описываю поздний этап, который сам помню. Сейчас я парень, у которого дрожат ноги, когда он идёт по лестнице, но зато он думает: «о, это ж лестница! По ней поднимаются. Пожалуй, надо поискать лифт». А раньше бы просто тупо стоял и смотрел. Так что много проблем ещё предстоит решить, но потрясающие врачи университетской Берлинской клиники «Шарите» решили главную. Они превратили меня из «технически живого человека» в того, кто имеет все шансы снова стать Высшей Формой Существа Современного Общества, – человеком, который умеет быстро листать инстаграм и без размышлений понимает, где ставить лайки.

A post shared by Алексей Навальный (@navalny) on Sep 19, 2020 at 2:09am PDT

 
Long road to recovery
 
“Not long ago, I didn't recognise people and couldn't understand how to speak,” he said. “How to find a word and how to make it mean something? This was all totally incomprehensible.
   
“I didn't know how to express my despair either and so I was just silent.”
   
The nerve agent Novichok disrupts communication between the brain, the main organs and muscles, while doctors say it gradually clears from the body.
   
Navalny, who said that he did not remember the early stage of his recovery, thanked the “fantastic doctors” treating him at Charite hospital.
 
   
He now saw a “clear path, although not a short one” to recovery, he said.
   
An avid user of social media, Navalny said that he hoped soon to be “able to scroll through Instagram and add likes without thinking about it”.
   
Navalny's supporters and some European leaders have said that poisoning with Novichok, a military-grade nerve agent, points to a state-ordered crime.
   
The revelations of nerve agent use have prompted calls for new sanctions against Russia and for Germany to abandon a near-completed project to carry Russian gas to Europe, Nord Stream 2.
   
Russia insists its medical tests did not detect any poison in Navalny's body. It says it lacks grounds for a criminal investigation, despite international calls for a transparent probe.
   
Navalny's aides said that German experts found traces of Novichok on a water bottle in his hotel room in the Siberian city of Tomsk.
   
Germany announced September 3 that medical tests from a military chemical weapons laboratory had found “unequivocal evidence” of the nerve agent.

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RUSSIA

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny discharged from Berlin hospital

Russia's leading opposition politician Alexei Navalny, who the West believes was poisoned with a Novichok nerve agent, has been discharged from hospital after just over a month, the Berlin medical facility treating him said Wednesday.

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny discharged from Berlin hospital
Alexei Navalny. Photo: Uncredited/Navalny Instagram/AP/DPA

“Based on the patient's progress and current condition, the treating physicians believe that complete recovery is possible,” Charite hospital said in a statement, adding however that it remained too early to assess any long-term effects of his severe poisoning.

The 44-year-old Kremlin critic and anti-corruption campaigner fell ill after boarding a plane in Siberia last month and was hospitalised there before being flown to Berlin.

He spent 32 days in the Berlin hospital, including 24 days in intensive care, before his release.

Germany has said toxicology tests provide “unequivocal proof” that he had been poisoned by the Soviet-era military-grade nerve agent, which was also used in a separate poisoning in 2018 on ex-double agent Sergei Skripal in Salisbury, Britain.

France and Sweden have since said tests they ran independently corroborate with Germany's conclusions.

European leaders have demanded explanations from Moscow, with Chancellor Angela Merkel saying that “only Russia can and must” provide answers on the poisoning.

READ ALSO: How Navalny case is poisoning ties between Germany and Russia

Navalny's allies say he may have been poisoned by a cup of tea he drank at Tomsk airport in Siberia.

But the Russian doctors who first treated Navalny said their tests did not find any toxic substances, and the Kremlin has rejected international calls for an investigation.

In his first blog post since emerging from coma, Navalny said on Monday that the three European labs had found Novichok “in and on my body”.

 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 

 
 
 

«Владимир Путин сообщил французскому коллеге: «Навальный мог сам проглотить этот яд». Хорошая версия. Считаю, что заслуживает самого пристального изучения. Сварил на кухне «Новичок». Тихо отхлебнул из фляжки в самолете. Впал в кому. До этого договорился с женой, друзьями и коллегами, что, если Минздрав будет настаивать, чтоб меня увезли лечить в Германию, они ни в коем случае не позволяли это сделать. Помереть в омской больнице и оказаться в омском морге, где установили бы причину смерти «пожил достаточно», – вот конечная цель моего хитрого плана. Но Путин меня переиграл. Его просто так не проведёшь. В итоге я, как дурак, пролежал в коме 18 дней, но своего не добился. Провокация не удалась!

A post shared by Алексей Навальный (@navalny) on Sep 22, 2020 at 12:04pm PDT

He noted that Russia had still not opened an investigation but that he “did not expect anything else.”

Navalny aides said Thursday that German experts found Novichok nerve agent on a water bottle taken from the hotel room where he stayed before being taken ill.

The bottle appears to have been key evidence for Germany's conclusion that the 44-year-old lawyer and outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin was poisoned with the military-grade nerve agent.

READ ALSO: Russian opposition leader 'can walk with a tremble' after Berlin treatment

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