The UK Foreign Office announced on 14 February 2026 that Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny was poisoned while serving a sentence in a penal colony, where he died in February 2024. The department stated that the findings were based on laboratory analysis of biological samples. The tests detected the presence of epibatidine, a toxic substance of natural origin. The ministry reported that the substance was used against Navalny during his imprisonment.
The information was presented at the Munich Security Conference. The United Kingdom referred the matter to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons as a breach of the Chemical Weapons Convention. According to the UK Foreign Office, the findings were also shared with international partners involved in analysing the test results.
