Days after his death, the body of Russian Opposition leader Alexei Navalny was finally located on Monday. According to the Russian media, bruises were found on the head and chest of Alexei Navalny's body, intensifying the foul play rumors in the death of the most prominent critic of Russia's President Vladimir Putin.
Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta Europe quoted experienced paramedics who claimed that Alexei Navalny's head and chest were bruised. The development came as the legal team and the family of Alexei Navalny accused Russian authorities of not handing over his body and acting as "murderers" attempting to conceal their actions.
“As an experienced paramedic, I can say that the injuries described by those who saw them appeared to be from convulsions. … If a person is convulsing and others try to hold him down but the convulsions are very strong, then bruising appears. They also said he had a bruise on his chest — the kind that comes from indirect cardiac massage,” the paramedic said.
The reports claim that protocol was not followed in the case of Alexei Navalny as his body was first taken to Labytnangi town, near the prison, and then transferred to Salekhard district hospital. But, the rules dictate that the body of the people who die in prison must be first taken to the Bureau of Forensic Medicine on Glazkova Street for autopsy.
“They drove him to the morgue, brought him in, and then stationed two policemen in front of the door. They might as well have put up a sign saying ‘Something mysterious is going on here!’ Of course, everyone wanted to know what had happened, what all the secrecy was about, and whether they were trying to hide something serious,” the paramedic told Novaya Gazeta Europe.
The paramedic said the doctors are sceptical about conducting an autopsy to find the reasons for Alexei Navalny's death as the case is political. The person said the doctors don't want to be a guilty party in the case, so they prefer to stall the autopsy.
“Some said that an order had come from Moscow to await the arrival of specialists from the capital, while others said that the hospital doctors themselves had refused to perform an autopsy. The case is political, and it is not clear how it will turn out. And if you perform an autopsy and receive a direct order to change the result, you can’t get out of it. And you can also be made the guilty party. … But if there was no autopsy, there’s nobody to ask,” the paramedic added.
The legal team of Alexie Navalny claimed that the Opposition leader was killed and that was why the authorities were concealing the cause of his death. The supporters of Alexie Navalny, who stepped out to pay tributes to the Opposition figure met with a brutal crackdown from police as more than 400 people were arrested from different parts of Russia.
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