DISINFO: Navalny could have caused his coma himself
SUMMARY
Navalny could have caused his coma himself. A few days before his hospitalization, blogger Alexei Navalny had problems with nutrition and digestion. The patient also used some kinds of diets. Navalny was trying to lose weight. The doctors received this data from the persons accompanying the blogger. In the two days that Navalny spent in a coma in the Omsk ambulance hospital No. 1, doctors were able to normalise carbohydrate metabolism in the blogger’s body. These parameters have nothing to do with Novichok and have nothing to do with it.
RESPONSE
No evidence given. To prove the allegation that Navalny "had problems with nutrition and digestion" the disinformation outlet refers to certain "data from the persons accompanying the blogger". But the persons accompanying Navalny made the opposite claims. A spokesperson for Navalny, one of two persons accompanying him on the plane when he fell ill, Kira Yarmysh, told media that Nvalny felt very well the day before he fell into the coma, the same morning and even minutes before it happened. No other claims were made by another colleagues of Navalny or his family. No evidence is given that, if proven that Navalny was on diet regime, it could lead to a severe sudden coma. Pro-Kremlin disinformation outlets give a variety of mutually exclusive versions of what happened to Navalny (for example, that he poisoned himself with alcohol, pills or that his poisoning profits the EU or even another opposition leader Mikhail Khodorkovsky). Similar techniques were used to refute the Skripals' poisoning with nerve agent Novichok by GRU agents. Background Russian opposition leader and a critic of Vladimir Putin Alexey Navalny has been suffering from suspected poisoning. He fell ill during a flight and the plane had to make an emergency landing in Omsk, where doctors said he was in a coma. Navalny has since been transferred to Berlin and is receiving treatment at Berlin's Charite Hospital. Clinical findings indicate poisoning with a substance from the group of cholinesterase inhibitors, said Charite. At the request of the Charité, a specialist Bundeswehr laboratory carried out toxicological tests on samples from Alexei Navalny. The results of these tests have revealed unequivocal proof of the presence of a chemical nerve agent from the Novichok group. Germany will forward the results of the toxicological test to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague.