"Nobody canceled the principle of reciprocity": the Russian Federation announced its readiness to respond to possible sanctions due to the situation with Navalny

Russia will not leave unanswered new Western sanctions if they are introduced, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in the Moscow.

Kremlin.

Putin "on the TV channel" Russia 1 ".

Answering the relevant question, Lavrov noted that nobody canceled the principle of reciprocity in international affairs.

“Nobody canceled the principle of reciprocity in international affairs.

Let's see what the new sanctions will be.

We will, of course, react.

This cannot be left without reaction, ”the TASS minister is quoted as saying.

Earlier, Dmitry Peskov, the press secretary of the Russian President, spoke about the prospects for imposing sanctions due to the situation with Navalny.

He questioned the existence of grounds for such a development of events and indicated that Russia does not intend to conduct a dialogue through sanctions.

“We do not understand what could be the reason for any sanctions.

On the whole, we do not accept the sanctions conversation and the sanctions language, we consider it absolutely unacceptable.

But in this case, we do not understand the reasons for discussing the topic of any sanctions, ”Peskov said in early September.

Thus, he answered the question whether the Kremlin expects sanctions from Germany or other European countries in connection with the situation with Navalny.

Recall that the incident with Alexei Navalny occurred in August 2020.

On the 20th, the blogger flew from Tomsk to Moscow.

On board the plane, he felt bad, and the liner urgently landed in Omsk, after which Navalny, who was unconscious, was urgently hospitalized.

Two days later, on August 22, after Russian doctors were able to stabilize the blogger's condition, he was transported to the Berlin clinic "Charite", since the patient's relatives insisted on this. 

Subsequently, German government spokesman Steffen Seibert, referring to research carried out by specialists from the laboratory of the German Armed Forces, said that Alexei Navalny was allegedly poisoned with a nerve agent from the Novichok group.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel also spoke about the situation.

She expressed the opinion that Navalny had become a "victim of a crime."

Later, the head of the German Foreign Ministry, Heiko Maas, did not rule out the introduction of sanctions in connection with the situation with Alexei Navalny, among which he named the suspension of the implementation of the Nord Stream 2 project.

In addition, the head of EU diplomacy, Josep Borrell, spoke about the likelihood of pan-European sanctions.

"The EU calls for a joint international response and reserves the right to take appropriate action, including through restrictive measures," Borrell said in a statement.

In turn, the Russian side has repeatedly called not to politicize the situation with Navalny.

Thus, in early September, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko, during a meeting with the European Union Ambassador Markus Ederer, declared the inadmissibility of unfounded accusations in the genre of “megaphone diplomacy” against Moscow.

“In connection with the statement of the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell on behalf of the European Union on September 3 about the situation around Alexei Navalny, it was pointed out that politicizing this issue and making unfounded accusations in the genre of“ megaphone diplomacy ”is unacceptable,” the Foreign Ministry said. RF.

On the eve of Russia's Permanent Representative to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya, indicated that Germany demands an investigation of the incident with the blogger, but there are no grounds for this procedure.

He also stressed that Berlin does not show a desire to cooperate on this issue.

According to the diplomat, at the moment the Russian side has not received any information that would allow the relevant departments to conduct their own de jure investigation.

Nebenzya called a paradoxical situation in which Russia is required to conduct an investigation, but refuses to cooperate with Russian law enforcement agencies and doctors.

He also recalled that a group of Russian doctors invited their German colleagues to discuss the available data on the health of Alexei Navalny.

"But again this was rejected ... We see a paradoxical situation ... How can we move forward if the German side refuses to cooperate?"

- said Russia's permanent representative to the UN.

He stressed that Moscow is extremely interested in clarifying the circumstances of what happened to Navalny.

“We are the party most interested in finding out what happened ... But we have not received any evidence from Germany that would allow us to conclude that it was a crime, an attempted poisoning, and thus begin investigation, ”he explained.