Poisoning of political opponents: The ‘dark’ past of Putin and the Kremlin

By Robert Hart

The Kremlin and senior Ukrainian officials have denied the allegations Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich and two Ukrainian negotiators poisoned during talks between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in Kyiv in early March.

All three have now recovered, but none were examined in time by a medical examiner to detect any suspicious substance, so the truth in this case will probably never be known. However, Putin and the Kremlin have a “past” in poisoning their opponents.

Specifically, the Alexei Navalny – leader of the Russian opposition and fierce critic of Putin – survived an assassination attempt on him in 2020, in which he used the neuroparalytic agent Novichok, an action that then German Chancellor Angela Merkel described as an attempt to “silence” Navalny the Russian government could respond.

In 2018, three people in Salisbury, England – among them the Russian former double agent Sergei Skripal– were poisoned with the military-level neurotoxic agent Novichok that had developed during the Soviet Union.

The then Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Theresa May described the incident as an “assassination attempt” and stressed that it was very possible that this action had received approval from the “high roofs” of the Russian state. In addition, charges have been filed against three Russian intelligence officers believed to be behind the attack (although no charges can be formally filed without the arrests and Russia does not extradite its citizens).

Another case is the former Russian spy and critic of Putin Alexander Litvinenko, who was killed in London in 2006 when his tea was poisoned with polonium, a crime that, according to a British investigation, had received Putin’s approval.

During his campaign for the Ukrainian presidency in 2004, against a pro-Russian candidate, the pro-Western candidate – and later president of Ukraine – Viktor Yushchenko he was poisoned with dioxin and his face was deformed. He – and not only – believes that the Kremlin was behind the attack against him, but this has never been proven.

The Kremlin has repeatedly denied any involvement in the poisoning of its opponents.

In recent history, the Kremlin’s political opponents appear to be more likely to be poisoned than the average Russian citizen. The very nature of the poison – since some substances are extremely difficult to detect, while evidence can be lost over time or during the decomposition of the body in the event of death, and from a legal point of view voluntary poisoning is a category that does not easily stands in court – combined with the opacity and denial of the Russian state that it is hiding behind these attacks, makes it rather unlikely to prove the truth.

Evidence of Russian involvement ranges from the level of strong or potential connection – Novichok agents, for example, are very difficult to develop and can only be prepared in secret military laboratories – to more vague and cyclical indications.

Russia’s interest in poisons dates back more than 100 years, when Vladimir Lenin ordered the creation of a secret chemical laboratory, Laboratory X, as the Soviets called it. The KGB used Laboratory X chemicals to silence state enemies at home and abroad. Among them is the Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov, who was murdered by ricin, with whom he came in contact through an umbrella, in London in the late 1970s.

Read also:

* Kremlin: Denies that Abramovich was poisoned