Navalny Grapples With Mystery Illness In Jail, spokeswoman says

Alexey Navalny, Russia’s most prominent opposition politician, is suffering from a mystery ailment in jail and has lost 8kg (17.6 pounds) in a little more than two weeks, his spokeswoman said.

An ambulance was called for Navalny overnight on Friday into Saturday at the maximum-security IK-6 penal colony at Melekhovo, about 250km, 115 miles, east of Moscow.

Kira Yarmysh, his spokeswoman, said in a video clip on Twitter that an unknown stomach complaint had flared up on Friday and prison doctors had treated him in the past by injecting him with medicine that they had refused to identify.

“We do not rule out that at this very time, Alexey Navalny is being slowly poisoned, being killed slowly so that it attracts less attention,” Yarmysh said in the Twitter post.

“He is being held in a punishment cell with acute pain without medical help,” she said.

When asked about a potential poisoning of Navalny, the Kremlin said it was not following the state of his health, which was a matter for the federal penitentiary service.

Aljazeera/Shakirat Sadiq