LOS ANGELES (OC).–European Union officials disseminated an autopsy report confirming that Russian opposition leader Alexi Navalny died of African poison dart poisoning, not from natural causes as stated by Russian authorities. Navalny committed suicide returning to the Russian Fedration Jan 17, 2021 after recovering from alleged KGB poisoning in Sibera. Navalny was told by former Yukos oil billionaire Mikhail Khordorkovsky to stay away from Russia or face certain arrest and imprisonment. Navalny ran an anti-Putin organization designed to topple Putin’s Kremlin government, claiming Putin was corrupt to the core. So, when Navalny returned to Moscow in 2021 he was promptly charged with subversion and treason, sentenced to a harsh Siberian penal colony where he died Feb. 16, 2024. EU officials didn’t hesitate to release their findings, a slap in the face to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
EU officials have been unyielding in opposing President Donald Trump’s peace plans, something they say favors Russia. Trump favors no one other than finding a workable peace deal that ends the four-year-old bloody war that killed tens-of-thousands of young Ukrainians and Russiana. EU’s report about Navalny’s death put Putin into the same category of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman who allegedly ordered the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi Oct. 2, 2018 at the Russian embassy in Istanbul. EU officials used their findings on Navalny’s death to oppose any settlement on ending the Ukraine War. Ukraine’s 38-year-old President Volodymyr Zelensky refuses to compromise with Putin to end the war. Zelensky has lost some 25% of Ukraine’s best sovereign territory battling the Kremlin over the last four years. EU officials don’t want to compromise with Putin.
EU officials use the Navalny findings to oppose Trump’s peace efforts to compromise with Putin and finally end the war. With Brussels recently loaning Zelensky 200 billion euros, Zelensky can keep the war going and bankrupt Kiev government afloat for another two years. But look what it’s doing to Ukraine’s infrastructure and youth that are deserting the military or draft dodging in record numbers. “We obviously are aware of the report. It’s a troubling report. We’re aware of that case of Mr. Navalny and certainly . . . we don’t have any reason to question it,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio told the press in Bratislava on a official visit to Slovakia. Britain, France Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands reported conclusively that Navalny was poisoned as his cause of death. Russian officials called the EU’s findings a “propaganda hoax” to smear the Russian Federation.
Calling the EU’s findings on Navalny “a Western propaganda hoax,” the Kremlin only makes itself more culpable, rather than saying they knew nothing about it. Russia has a long history of poisoning former KGB or FSB agents that have gone to the West especially in Great Britain where some high profile poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal March 4, 2018 with radioactive Polonium 210. So, when it comes to Russian officials denying poisoning former traitors to the Russian state there’s too much history to ignore it. British officials recall well the Polonium 210 poisoning of former double-agent Alexander Litvinenko Nov. 23, 2006. Whatever happened to Navalny, he brought it on himself returning to Moscow after recovering from Polonium 210 poisoning. EU officials can point fingers at Putin but it’s a lousy excuse not to settle the Ukraine War.
Navalny boasted about running a nationwide anti-corruption campaign to prove Putin’s corruption at the highest levels, seeking nothing short of revolution. Making his intentions to topple the Putin government, Navalny martyred himself to liberate Russia of Putin’s rule. How much Navalny read Putin’s approval ratings, some 80% of the Russian population liked his policies, regardless of the Ukraine War. Rubio told the press it wasn’t up to the United States to take side in the EU’s findings regarding Navalny’s death. “Those countries came to that conclusion. The coordinated that. We chose—Doesn’t mean we disagree with the outcome. We just, it wasn’t, out endeavor. Soemtimes country go out and do their thing with based on intelligence they’ve gathered,” Rubio said, walking tightrope about joining the EU’s condemnation of Putin.
Trump has worked hard since taking office on restoring U.S.-Russian relations. Former President Joe Biden was the first-and-only U.S. president to go to war against the Kremlin. Trump though the U.S. had bigger fish to fry with the Kremlin, needing to reset diplomatic relations to improve U.S. foreign policy and national security. Trump wanted to get back to nuclear nonproliferation and global cooperation, something that made the world a safer place. Trump told Zelensky Feb. 28m 2025 that he was going to start WW III in Europe by continuing to battle the Kremlin. Zelensky rebelled against Trump, running to the EU to oppose Trump’s peace plans. So, the EU raises the Navalny poisoning to justfy opposing any peace plan with Putin. Meanwhile, Ukraine continues its battering, losing more land daily, battling the Kremlin into an indefinite future.
About the Author
John M. Curtis write politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
