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Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny
Photo: Pavel Golovkin / dpa
Russian President Vladimir Putin publicly assures again and again that the case of the poisoned opposition activist Alexei Navalny does not concern him.
However, the Kremlin critic has kept the Russian judicial system on its toes for weeks.
Now the Russian General Prosecutor's Office has sent a new request to the German judiciary and asked to inspect the interrogation files.
Since most of the requests from Russian investigators had been rejected and the transcripts of the interrogations of Navalny and his wife were not included, previous requests for legal assistance were considered to be completely inadequate, the authority said.
After being poisoned with the neurotoxin Novitschok in Russia, Navalny was initially treated at the Berlin Charité.
Later he stayed in Germany for several months to recover.
Research by SPIEGEL, the research network Bellingcat and other media shows that Russian secret agents have been preparing the killing of Navalny for a long time.
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The opposition member backed this up with his own research and blames a »killer squad« from the domestic intelligence service FSB for the attack in the Siberian city of Tomsk.
Putin and the FSB reject the allegations.
Foreign Minister Lavrov calls German answers "unworthy"
Before the renewed Russian inquiry, the Federal Office of Justice stated that it had answered four requests for mutual legal assistance regarding the attack on Navalny.
The Russian General Prosecutor's Office now suspects that the "true circumstances of the incident" should be concealed.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov described the answers from Germany as "unworthy".
With the new request, the Russian authorities say they want to ensure that the German side "fully" complies with the requests for legal assistance sent last year.
In the past, Germany had made the disclosure of information about Nawalny's state of health dependent on his consent.
Kremlin calls for free advertising for Navalny on social media
The Russian government is trying to reduce Navalny's reach in social media.
Most recently, the Kremlin asked the video platform TikTok in particular to stop advertising for the imprisoned opposition politician Alexej Navalny.
"We ask you immediately to take extensive measures to prevent the dissemination of such illegal information on TikTok," says a message from the telecommunications regulator Roskomnadzor.
Specifically, the authority refers to calls to take part in a demonstration for the Kremlin critic that has been announced and not approved for Saturday.
Navalny had flown back to Moscow from Germany on Sunday and was arrested there at the airport.
Shortly afterwards, a court sentenced him to 30 days in prison.
He is currently in the notorious "Sailor Rest" prison in Moscow.
The opposition member called on his supporters to protests across the country next Saturday.
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fek / dpa / Reuters