Floral tributes, photos of the late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny and messages appear outside the former Russian embassy in Tbilisi on March 1, 2024.
Vano Shalamov | AFP | Getty Images
US intelligence agencies have concluded that Russian President Vladimir Putin may not have directly ordered the killing of Alexei Navalny at a remote penal colony in February, according to three sources familiar with the matter. But the exact circumstances of the opposition leader's death in the Arctic prison remain unclear.
The sources said that this assessment does not absolve Putin of ultimate responsibility for Navalny's fate, but it is likely that the Russian president did not call for his killing at the time. By sending Navalny to a high-security penal colony in a remote town above the Arctic Circle, the Kremlin effectively imposed a death sentence on the opposition leader, the sources said.
The sources said the results reflect a broad consensus among various intelligence agencies.
The Wall Street Journal was the first to publish the intelligence community's assessment.
After Navalny's death, President Joe Biden said that while Washington lacks information about the exact circumstances, “there is no doubt that Navalny's death was the result of something that Putin and his thugs did.”
Russia's Federal Prison Service said in a statement at the time that Navalny died after feeling unwell after walking.
The CIA and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment.
Navalny was 47 when he died and was serving a 30-and-a-half-year prison sentence. As Russia's most famous and popular dissident, Navalny's death dealt a severe blow to the country's opposition movement, which had been brutally suppressed by the Kremlin.
During a business trip in Russia in 2020, Navalny was poisoned with the military nerve agent Novichok. Navalny and Western officials blamed Putin for the attempted assassination of Navalny.
The poison used on Navalny was similar to the one used by Russian military intelligence against retired GRU officer Sergei Skripal in a 2018 assassination attempt in the United Kingdom, according to Western governments.
Russia has denied its government's involvement in Navalny's poisoning in 2020 or his death in prison in February.
Before Navalny's death, there were tentative discussions about a possible prisoner exchange with Russia involving Navalny and Americans detained in Russia, NBC News previously reported.
Navalny's allies claim that Putin ordered the dissident's killing to thwart a proposed prisoner swap that would have led to his release.
Russia denied this accusation.
