As of: February 26, 2024, 5:18 p.m
By: Felix Durach
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A few days before the death of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, his release was said to have been negotiated.
This emerges from a video from his foundation.
Berlin – The late Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny could apparently have been released shortly before his death in a Siberian prison camp.
Navalny is said to have been part of a planned prisoner exchange.
Maria Pevchik, the head of Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation, said this on Monday in a video published on the YouTube platform.
Memorials to Alexei Navalny are already being set up at many Russian embassies in Europe.
© IMAGO/ZUMA Wire/Volha Shukaila
Prisoner exchange planned before Navalny’s death – “could be sitting here today in my place”
“Alexei Navalny could be sitting here today if I were me,” Pevchik said at the beginning of the video.
The Kremlin critic, who died on February 16, should have been freed “in the coming days.”
At the beginning of February, Russian President Vladimir Putin will receive an offer to bring the so-called “Tiergarten Murderer” Vadim Krasikov back to Russia – in exchange for two Americans and Navalny.
Pevchik received information on the evening of February 15 that the discussions were in the “final phase”.
A day later, Navalny died in the “Polar Wolf” prison camp in Siberia.
Pevchik went on to say in the video that plans for an exchange had been in the works since Navalny's arrest.
The plan was to free the Kremlin critic in exchange for Russian spies.
The development of the plan took a total of two years.
Pevchik cited a lack of political will as the reason it took years rather than months and criticized the behavior of U.S. and German officials.
The Russian oligarch Roman Abramowich is also said to have been involved in the discussions about the exchange.
In order to prevent exchanges - the chairwoman of Navalny's foundation accuses Putin of targeted killing
Pevchik accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of ordering Navalny's killing so that the prisoner exchange would not take place.
Putin's goal was to check Germany's willingness to extradite Krasikov to Russia.
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