Image: G. Lacz/imageBROKER/picture alliance
A rare frog poison has been named as the cause of the 2024 death of Russian democracy fighter Alexei Navalny. But it’s unlikely to have come from a frog.
A poison found in threatened frog species in the Ecuadorian foothills has been named as the cause of Alexei Navalny’s death in prison.
Scientists from Germany, France, the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK performed a postmortem analysis of the Russian pro-democracy campaigner and opposition leader, who died on February 16, 2024.
In a joint statement, released during the Munich Security Conference, they declared traces of the chemical epibatidine had been detected in Navalny’s tissue samples and that “poisoning was highly likely the cause of his death.”
As Navalny died while imprisoned in Siberia, the five nations accused Russia of having deliberately administered the poison.
Frogs with a poisonous skin
Epibatidine is a poison contained within the skin of certain poison dart frogs and, as noted by the five nations, is not found naturally in Russia.
The frogs that produce the toxin live in the Ecuadorian foothills and include Anthony’s dart frog (Epipedobates anthonyi) and the phantasmal dart frog (Epipedobates tricolor). According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, the phantasmal dart frog is threatened.
These frog species feed on insects. Alkaloid chemicals that emerge during digestion are concentrated into toxins that are stored within the frogs’ skin, which is brightly-colored as a warning to predators. The frogs have evolved to tolerate the lethal substances.
There are many varieties of frog skin toxins, including the paralysis-causing batrachotoxin.
Of course, dart frogs are so named for their historic use by indigenous South American peoples, who were known to coat their arrowheads in the deadly secretions before going hunting. Epibatidine-producing frogs were not known to be used in this practice.
A deadly chemical, not a viable painkiller
Epibatidine, as identified in Navalny, was first identified by American chemist and pharmacologist John W. Daly when he extracted and analyzed less than a milligram of the toxin from phantasmal poison frogs in the 1970s.
Many animal and plant toxins have been formulated into beneficial drugs, painkillers and continue to be researched for potential treatments for hard-to-treat illnesses like cancer.
So it was that epibatidine was investigated for possible human benefit as a potential non-addictive painkiller.
But the toxin is so powerful, with little difference between its lethal to non-lethal doses, that pharmacists have been unable to develop it into a feasible painkiller for humans.
It is known that epibatidine:
- Is about 200 times more powerful than morphine.
- At toxic levels, causes seizures and paralysis of the lung muscles, leading to asphyxiation.
Germany, the UK, Netherlands, France and Sweden said Alexei Navalny was killed with poison – Image: Sefe Karacan/AA/picture alliance
Did Russia go to Ecuador to get dart poison?
Scientists regularly extract animal venoms and toxins for research and to develop medical drugs and antidotes.
But it’s unlikely that Russia would have flown to Ecuador to extract a sample of dart frog poison.
Instead, authorities believe that the poison would have been synthesized in a lab.
Vil Mirzayanov, a Russian analytical chemist who has lived in the United States since the 1990s and revealed his involvement in the development of new Novichok (or newcomer) agents after the fall of the Soviet Union, said it was “not new” that Russia’s State Research Institute of Organic Chemistry and Technology (or GosNIIOKhT) worked with natural toxins, pointing out that ricin and fentanyl agents had also been developed at the institute.
He agreed that it was more likely that any toxin used was likely lab-made.
“I think this dart frog poison was synthesized because it’s very tough to imagine that they brought kilograms, maybe even 100 grams, from somewhere, from South America,” Mirzayanov told DW.
Mirzayanov said it was likely that Russia’s security services, which have their own advanced laboratories, would have been responsible for administering any poison.
Five nations refer Russia for treaty breach
Though the five nations have claimed their results as proof Navalny was deliberately poisoned, Russia has denied the allegations.
Navalny had previously been flown to Germany in 2020 with a life-threatening illness from nerve agent poisoning. Russia also denied responsibility on that occasion.
Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, described the five nations’ findings as “science-proven” evidence of his murder, saying on social media that “[Vladimir] Putin killed Alexei with a chemical weapon”.
The five nations involved in the analysis have referred Russia to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons for breaching the Chemical Weapons Convention.
DW.com/NAN 17-2-26
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