Kremlin says EU sanctions over Navalny ‘unfriendly’

By Dmitri Chirciu

MOSCOW (AA) - The EU sanctions on six Russian individuals and one entity is an “unfriendly” and “deliberate move against Moscow”, a Kremlin spokesman said Thursday.

The EU on Thursday announced sanctions on six individuals and one research institute from Russia for their alleged involvement in the poisoning of opposition leader Alexey Navalny.

“The EU harmed our relations with this decision. Of course, Moscow will analyze the situation and act in its own interests,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

The sanctions list includes Russian intelligence chief Aleksandr Bortnikov, two deputy defense ministers, Pavel Popov and Aleksey Krivoruchko, Plenipotentiary Representative of the President of the Russian Federation in the Siberian Federal District Sergei Menyailo, First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Executive Office of the Russian Federation Sergei Kiriyenko, and Andrei Yarin, the chief of the Presidential Domestic Policy Directorate.

Sanctions were also imposed on the State Scientific Research Institute for Organic Chemistry and Technology in Russia.

Alexey Navalny, 44, a fierce critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, fell sick on Aug. 20 on a flight to Moscow. After an emergency landing in the Siberian city of Omsk, he spent two days in a Russian hospital before being sent to Berlin for treatment.

After running tests in several labs, German officials announced that Navalny was poisoned with the nerve agent Novichok, which was also used, according to the UK government, in a 2018 attack on former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the British town of Salisbury.

Russian authorities deny any involvement in the case, saying chemical weapons are neither developed nor produced in the country since the last chemical round was destroyed in 2017, as verified and certified by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.

Following treatment, Navalny was discharged from a Berlin hospital on Sept. 23.

* Writing and contribution by Busra Nur Bilgic Cakmak