Putin acknowledges Navalny's death
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that if he had not died, Navalny would have been exchanged for Russian prisoners held in the West.
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12PUNTO FOREIGN NEWS
Re-elected Russian President Vladimir Putin said that if opposition leader Alexei Navalny had not lost his life, he would have been released in exchange for Russian prisoners held by the West.
Speaking to his supporters on Sunday, Putin stated that senior Russian officials had proposed the idea of a prisoner swap with the West a few days before Navalny's death.
In his speech, Putin described Navalny's death as a 'sad event'.
Speaking in central Moscow after initial results showed he had won the presidential election in Russia by a landslide, Putin said that unnamed individuals had proposed a few days before his death that Navalny be released in a prisoner swap deal with the West.
Putin said, "The person who was talking to me had not even finished his sentence, and I said I agreed. But unfortunately, what happened, happened."
Putin used the expressions, "I agreed on one condition: we exchange him and he does not return. But that is life. When things like this happen, there is nothing you can do about it, that is life."
Navalny's allies had previously claimed that Putin had the opposition leader killed in prison to sabotage a prisoner swap in which Navalny would have been exchanged for a hitman imprisoned in Germany.
Leonid Volkov, a long-time ally of Navalny, said in a statement on his X account on Sunday that Putin's comments were an admission that he had killed Navalny himself. Volkov wrote, "Putin killed Alexei Navalny. And he decided that he no longer needed to pretend. He confirmed this himself."