Reddened and watery eyes, peeling face and hands… Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich suffered from symptoms that suggest possible poisoning, a source familiar with the matter told AFP on Monday, March 28, confirming information from the wall street journal. Roman Abramovich is trying to mediate between Moscow and kyiv to put an end to the war in Ukraine, as confirmed by the Kremlin on Tuesday March 29 by the voice of the spokesperson for the Russian presidency Dmitri Peskov.
After a meeting in the Ukrainian capital in March, the billionaire owner of the English football club Chelsea, as well as at least two senior officials of the Ukrainian negotiating team “developed symptoms”, wrote the American newspaper, citing “persons aware of this situation”. These symptoms then improved “and their lives are not in danger”, he added. “Unfortunately, what reported the wall street journal took place, and Roman Abramovich is fine. He continues to be active in the negotiations,” a source familiar with the matter in London confirmed to AFP. The billionaire is present on Tuesday at the talks between kyiv and Moscow organized in Turkey. poisoning, and suspected hardliners in Moscow who they say want to sabotage talks aimed at ending the war in Ukraine.
According to the Bellingcat investigative site, “the three men had only consumed chocolate and water in the hours before the onset of symptoms”. Bellingcat said on Twitter that “experts have reported that the dosage and type of poison used was likely insufficient to endanger lives, and was likely used to scare victims.” The Kremlin has in any case rejected the assertions of the wall street journal and from American sources. “This is part of the information war” against Russia, assured Dmitri Peskov on Tuesday, adding that “this information does not of course correspond to reality”.
Navalny, Litvinenko, Yushchenko…
In recent years, other Russian or Ukrainian personalities have been poisoned. This is particularly the case of Alexeï Navalny. Renowned for his investigations into the corruption of the elites, the opponent of Vladimir Putin has suffered for more than two years an uninhibited repression of power. In August 2020, he fell seriously ill, victim of poisoning with a nerve agent sponsored, according to him, by the Russian president. The Kremlin denies this, but Russian authorities have never investigated the alleged assassination attempt.
This is also the case of Alexander Litvinenko. In 2006, the ex-agent of the Russian secret services of the FSB, opposing the Kremlin in exile, died of poisoning with polonium-210. It is a very toxic radioactive substance that causes a slow and painful death. A British investigation established, nearly ten years later, the guilt of two Russian performers who had had tea with the victim in a hotel. She concluded that Moscow was responsible, which, for its part, has always denied these accusations.
Another former agent came out of it with more luck: Sergei Skripal. On March 4, 2018, the former Russian double agent and his daughter Yulia were found unconscious in a shopping center in Salisbury, in the south of England. They are hospitalized in serious condition. London accuses Moscow of being behind this poisoning with Novichok – a nerve agent developed by the USSR in the 1970s and 1980s – in retaliation for its collaboration with British intelligence. Sergei Skripal and his daughter finally leave the hospital in the following months. But, here again, Moscow rejects these accusations.
Fourteen years earlier, another poisoning, very media, had hit the headlines: that of the Ukrainian opposition candidate Viktor Yushchenko. In 2004, the hero of the Orange Revolution fell seriously ill. He was then in the middle of the campaign for the presidential election, opposing him to the candidate supported by Moscow, Viktor Yanukovych. Austrian doctors manage to identify the cause of his condition: it is dioxin poisoning, the politician with dioxin concentrations 1000 times higher than the norm. Despite treatment, Viktor Yushchenko, elected a year later to the presidency (2005-2010), will always bear the scars of his intoxication. If the responsibility for this act has not been officially established, suspicions quickly turned to the Russian and Ukrainian security services.