Aides: Here's How Navalny Was Poisoned

The German government says there is "unequivocal proof" that Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny was poisoned with a Novichok nerve agent—and Navalny's aides say they have now found the source. An Instagram post shared Thursday shows aides searching Navalny's hotel room in the Siberian city of Tomsk after he was poisoned last month. They said a German lab detected the nerve agent on empty water bottles they removed from the room, the BBC reports. Other international labs have also determined that Novichok was used. When the Putin critic became ill on Aug. 20, spokeswoman Kira Yarmysh said she suspected a cup of tea, the only thing she had seen him eat or drink, had been poisoned.

Navalny's aides decided to search his hotel room because they didn't trust Russian authorities to carry out a proper investigation. "It was decided to take everything that could be useful in some hypothetical way and pass it on to doctors in Germany," the Instagram post said, per the Washington Post. "It was also obvious that the case would not be investigated in Russia. And this is exactly what happened." They said the water bottles with traces of poison were the free ones the hotel left in its rooms. Navalny spent weeks in an induced coma after the poisoning. This week, the 44-year-old said his condition is improving and he can now breathe on his own. Aides say that despite the attack, which they blame on the Kremlin, Navalny intends to return to Russia as soon as he is able. (More Alexei Navalny stories.)