I think they're trying to poison me”: The lawyer finds out what Navalny had said a few months before his death.

Alexey Navajo, the late leader of the Russian opposition, had said he thought he was being poisoned a few months before he died suddenly in prison, his ex-Avokat said.

By Foreign mediaL.A., Olga Mikhailova, who worked as Navally's lawyer for 16 years, told Russian media Meduza that when she visited her in April 2023, he said: <x0... listen, I don't want to be paranoid, but I think they're trying to poison me”.

She said that immediately after he told her, she posted the charge to X and made some official complaints.

Navalny, one of Russian President Vladimir Putin's most open critics, died in a Russian prison on 16 February, where he had been held since 2021 on charges widely seen as politically motivated.

Mikhailova said she and the rest of the Navajo legal team were concerned about his health in custody.

She stressed that the first time she saw him properly face to face after his imprisonment was at court hearings in 2023 and that it was “taken by” from his appearance.

She claimed that while in the colony, Navajo was not properly fed, was not allowed to sleep, and had been put in a cell.

And Navajo's health deteriorated while in prison and at one point he went on a hunger strike for complaints that he was not being given medical treatment.

When the Russian Federal Prison Service announced the death of Navajo, he said he felt good after taking a walk and almost immediately lost consciousness. Later I claimed that he died for natural causes.

Western leaders, including President Joe Biden, have accused Vladimir Putin of staying behind the death of Navalny.

Navalny campaigned against Putin and his inner circle for years, exposing their corruption and keeping rallying against the Kremlin.