Navalny announces return to Russia

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The Kremlin opponent Alexei Navalny wants to return to Moscow this Sunday after being poisoned last summer. He landed on January 17th with a plane operated by the Russian airline Pobeda, he announced in the short message service Twitter on Wednesday. Navalny was poisoned with the neurotoxin Novitschok in August and has been in Germany for treatment ever since. He accuses Putin of being the mastermind behind the attack. The question of a return never arose for him because he never left Russia himself, the 44-year-old now wrote. He said, I arrived in Germany in a resuscitation box, referring to his coma lasting several weeks after the attack in Russia. He has probably recovered almost completely from his poisoning, he shared on Instagram. The last time he was in Germany was for a rehab measure. Navalny blames a killer squad of the FSB's domestic secret service operating under the orders of Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin for the poisonous attack with a chemical warfare agent by the Novichok group. Russia denies involvement in the case and demands evidence of poisoning from Germany, for example. Only then do you want to initiate an investigation. Most recently, the Russian authorities increased the pressure on Navalny. It was only on Tuesday that it became known that the prison authorities wanted to take the opposition activists to prison for allegedly missing probation conditions. A corresponding application was made to a Moscow court. Shortly before the turn of the year, the authorities had asked Navalny in writing to meet the requirements of an earlier sentence and to report in person to the Russian authorities. Otherwise there is a risk of imprisonment. The case concerns a conviction from 2014. Navalny wrote that the suspended sentence ended on December 30th last year. There are also investigations against the government critic for alleged fraud. The Russian Investigation Committee accused him of having used donations equivalent to 3.9 million euros to his anti-corruption fund for personal purposes for example, to buy property and finance holidays. Navalny refused. The Putin opponent had always declared that he wanted to continue his work in Russia. The German government and other Western states speak of an attempted murder of Navalny, and the poisoning was followed by European sanctions against Russia. In response, Moscow recently imposed entry bans on other British citizens.