American intelligence services have concluded that Putin most likely did not give the order to kill Navalny in February while he was in prison, “The Wall Street Journal” writes.
Representatives of the US Central Intelligence Agency, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the State Department’s Intelligence Division are said to share this view.
US President Biden and other world leaders believe that Putin is responsible because the Kremlin pursued Navalny for years, including an alleged attempt to kill him in 2020. But the US believes that the time of Navalny’s death was not chosen by Putin.
However, Navalny’s allies insist that his death was orchestrated by the Kremlin. In a statement, Leonid Volkov rejected the assessment of the US intelligence services as “naïve”. Those who claim Putin didn’t know, he said, “obviously don’t understand anything about how modern Russia works.”
The director of the Polish Institute of International Relations, Slavomir Dembskis, also questioned the assessment of the US intelligence services.
“Navalny was a very valuable prisoner from a political point of view, and everyone knew that Putin had a personal interest in his fate. The chance of such an accidental death is slim,” he said.
As he was the last opposition figure in Russia with enough political influence to be considered a possible leader, his death is likely to be the culmination of a long campaign by the Kremlin to destroy or drive out any potential alternatives to Putin.
Tags: Wall Street Journal reveals Putins role Navalnys death
