A bombshell video by Alexei Navalny’s team claims that the Russian opposition politician was deliberately killed on President Vladimir Putin’s orders on the eve of a prisoner exchange that would have seen him released in return for an FSB assassin jailed in Germany.
In a YouTube video published Monday titled “Why did Putin kill Navalny now?” the opposition politician’s close ally Maria Pevchikh said that after months of lobbying for a prisoner swap involving Navalny, “by the spring of last year our plan was approved.”
“Navalny was supposed to be free in the coming days because we had achieved a decision on his exchange,” she said. Pevchikh added that Russian billionaire oligarch Roman Abramovich had acted as a personal liaison between Western officials and Putin in brokering the deal. POLITICO has not been able to independently verify Pevchikh’s claims.
Pevchikh said the deal included Vadim Krasikov, an FSB agent jailed in Germany for murdering a former Chechen commander in 2019, and “two American citizens.”
Pevchikh added she had received confirmation late on Feb. 15 that such a swap was going to take place but believed Putin then changed his mind.
“Since they are willing to exchange Krasikov on principle then I just need to get rid of the bargaining chip [Navalny,],” Pevchikh surmised Putin’s thinking. “Then offer someone else when the time comes.”
“It’s absolutely illogical, irrational, it’s the behavior of a mad mafioso. But the point is that Putin has gone mad with hatred for Navalny,” she said.
The Kremlin did not immediately comment on the Navalny team’s allegations.
On Feb. 16, a day after Pevchikh claims to have received confirmation the deal was “in its final stages,” Navalny was reported to have collapsed and died after a walk in the penal colony where he was being held north of the Arctic circle.
In the video, Pevchikh did not mention the names of the two U.S. citizens, but if such a deal ever existed, it would likely have included the U.S. journalist Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan, who have both been jailed in Russia on espionage charges widely seen as fabricated.
In an interview with the U.S. right-wing pundit Tucker Carlson earlier this month, Putin said he did not exclude a deal for the release of Wall Street Journal reporter Gershkovich “if our partners take reciprocal steps.”
He then spoke about “a person, due to patriotic sentiments, [who] eliminated a bandit in one of the European capitals,” in a statement widely seen as confirmation that Putin wanted Krasikov to be released in return.