NYemetsky diplomats explained the inconsistency of dates in the draft OPCW report describing the situation around Navalny’s hospitalization as a technical error. It was corrected after a representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry drew attention to it
There was a technical error in the draft report of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which described the situation around the poisoning of Alexei Navalny, it was corrected after the representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, drew attention to it. This was reported to RBC at the German Embassy in Russia.
The draft OPCW report on the implementation of the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on Their Destruction in 2020 was submitted on May 17. “In this document, in the context of sending an OPCW group to Germany, an incorrect date was specified, at the request of Germany, the OPCW technical secretariat corrected this error. Immediately after that, a new version of the report was presented to the participating states, ” the diplomats said.
The new version of the report indicates the correct date of Germany’s appeal to the OPCW for technical assistance-September 4. “As stated by the press secretary of the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Berlin on July 14, thus all the disputed points were clarified,” the embassy stressed.
On August 20, the plane on which Navalny was flying from Tomsk urgently landed in Omsk due to the poor health of the oppositionist.Navalny was placed in the toxicoreanimation department of the city hospital, where he fell into a coma. He stayed in Omsk for less than two days: on the night of August 22, he was transported to the Berlin clinic “Charite”. On September 2, after conducting the necessary examinations, the German government announced that traces of a chemical warfare agent from the Novichok group were found in the body of the oppositionist.
On October 6, 2020, the OPCW presented its first own report on the situation with Alexey Navalny. The organization confirmed that biomarkers of a cholinesterase inhibitor were found in Navalny’s body, indicating that a toxic substance from the Novichok group was used against him. The technical specialists of the organization carried out the analyses at the request of Berlin.
On May 17, the OPCW published an annual report, which also mentioned the situation with Navalny. Maria Zakharova drew attention to the inconsistency of dates in this document on July 14. She noted that if a group of OPCW specialists was sent to Germany on August 20, as stated in the original draft of the document, then the application for this from Berlin should have come earlier than this date. “Knowing the bureaucracy of the Germans, knowing the bureaucracy of the OPCW, you can imagine such a thingonly in one case: everything was played out in advance, ” the representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry noted. From this, the representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry concluded that ” Western colleagues, holding hands with Navalny, are amicably going to the bottom with their story about chemical weapons poisoning.” On the same day, the German Foreign Ministry explained that the document that Zakharova studied was a draft in which a typo crept in, and it was corrected in the second edition.
The Russian authorities have repeatedly denied involvement in the possible poisoning of Navalny, accusing Western countries of fabricating the conclusions of the investigation. Russian experts also disagree with the conclusions of their colleagues from the Bundeswehr: Omsk doctors and the Ministry of Internal Affairs named several versions among the possible reasons for hospitalization, including metabolic disorders and chronic pancreatitis.
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