All language subtitles for The.Man.Putin.Couldnt.Kill.2021.PROPER.1080p.WEBRip.x265-RARBG

can be seriously bad for
your health.

- Putin has made it very
clear that traitors

don't deserve to live.

Assassins can track
you down, wherever you are.

In August 2020,

Russia's charismatic
opposition leader,

Aleksei Navalny,

was poisoned with
the notorious weapon Novichok.

Miraculously, he survived.

- Putin, he's using this
to kill me and,

you know, terrify others.

This is an
extraordinary story

of assassination squads...

- A murder machine exists
in Russia,

and it is killing or trying
to kill many people.

..a family risking
everything...

I'm his wife
so if I fall apart,

everyone else will collapse
like dominoes.

..an astonishing
confession...

We focussed on the
inside of the underpants.

At least, those were
the parts we treated.

- It's the first time
in history that a murderer

admitted to the victim that
they tried to kill him.

..and poisoned underpants.

- I became the first person
in history

whose underpants were discussed

at the Security Council
of Russia.

It's a tale of two men.

One has a team of assassins
at his disposal.

The other's only weapons -
a sense of humour,

a team
of intrepid investigators

and the power of social media.

At stake, the future of Russia.

It's 20 of August, 2020.

Aleksei Navalny
is flying home to Moscow

from the Siberian city of Tomsk

in Russia's vast hinterland.

He's President Putin's
most famous opponent,

so he's recognised everywhere.

I asked, "Is it OK if we take
a selfie together?"

He said he didn't mind,
so we took one.

This could have
been the last photograph

Navalny ever posed for.

He doesn't know it yet,
but he's been poisoned.

In less than an hour,
he'll be in a coma.

Navalny boards the plane

for the 3,000km flight
west to Moscow.

His assistant, Kira Yarmysh,
is with him.

He starts to watch his
favourite cartoon,

'Rick And Morty'.

- After a while Aleksei said,
"I don't feel well.

"Can you talk to me
to distract me?"

I turned and saw he was
as white as a sheet.

The trolley came by
and I asked

if he could have some water,

because he was
obviously not well.

He looked at the trolley
for a long time and said,

"No, I need to get up."

About 15 minutes passed
and he hadn't come back.

A stewardess made
an announcement

asking if there was
a doctor on board.

I turned round to look

and Aleksei wasn't in his seat.

- He was lying on the floor
in the kitchen area.

I ran there.

Then he stopped
responding to us.

He's lying on the floor.

He's unwell.

It's probably poisoning.

- The pilot said a man on
the plane has been taken ill,

so I'm diverting
our plane to Omsk.

The plane immediately banked,

changed course
and we started to land.

Paramedics are
waiting on the runway.

Two doctors came on board.

They immediately put
Aleksei on a drip.

I've no idea what it was.

The doctors in the plane
and in the ambulance

told me that Aleksei
had been poisoned.

With his heart rate slowing,

they give him atropine -

a standard treatment
for insecticide poisoning.

But none of the medics know
whether he'll live or die.

But why would anyone
want to kill him?

Dobryy den!

For the last 10 years,

Navalny's sophisticated
YouTube videos

have made him Vladimir Putin's
most effective opponent.

His craving for luxury and
wealth is completely crazy.

It wasn't always this way.

These are his first less than
impressive efforts from 2007.

Testing
the horizontal format.

But Navalny's
confidence in the possibilities

of the internet was unshakeable.

We can see the reaction,
we can see the reaction.

- He told me that this is
the future of politics,

and the young generation,
they are in the internet,

they are online,

and talking to them
is the future of Russia.

How do you feel
about United Russia?

The United Russia Party
is totally corrupt.

First, he developed
his LiveJournal account,

then appeared Twitter...

..Facebook, and then,

after some time, YouTube,

so it was a very gradual
development

and emergence of Navalny's
social media empire.

The Crimean Spring
actually started...

Most Russian TV
stations were effectively

mouthpieces for Putin
and his party, United Russia.

Today we are celebrating
the anniversary

of a landmark event for
the whole country.

The referendum in which
the people of Crimea

voted for reunification.

Hey, hey!

The internet,
however, was still free.

All my videos have been...

Here's a palace. He's a thief.
He took a kickback.

Navalny's live broadcasts

and investigations
into corruption

were seen by tens of millions.

He buys up properties
by Lake Como in Italy

as if he wasn't a Russian
propagandist and patriot,

but a Hollywood star.

Over the years,

he's made hundreds of videos
from all over Russia.

And on the day before
the poisoning,

he's in Siberia to shoot
his latest one.

He's here to support
two anti-Putin candidates

standing for election

and, as always,

highlighting local corruption.

- These guys take
a lot of money.

Let's look at the invoices.

Maintenance of
an apartment building.

- Corruption is something
that every Russian

sees in their life
every single day.

And so that's an issue

that sort of gets
people's attention,

and that focuses these sometimes

disparate public expressions
of discontent

against the Kremlin
and the Putin regime

into one very clear direction.

This is our country

and these crooks
are stealing our money.

He wins people over
with his courage.

I think he's found a way
to talk to people,

showing them how the system
is broken and terribly corrupt.

You know how often
in sci-fi movies,

you see a city and
a beautiful, peaceful landscape.

But if you look
with magic vision,

it's a completely
different picture.

This whole city is so entwined
in a web of corruption,

that everyone - the old man,

the cyclist,
the kissing couple -

are transformed into prey.

Navalny's single-minded focus

on corruption has made him
powerful enemies,

and he's not
the only person in Tomsk

on a special mission.

While he's out filming,

a secret hit squad
that has been following him

for over three years is
breaking into his hotel room.

The next morning,

Navalny is in a coma
when his wife, Yulia,

is called by Kira Yarmysh.

- Kira said,
"Yulia, don't worry,

"Aleksei has been poisoned.
We landed in Omsk".

She was in shock.

She told me everything
in a rush.

I said, "Alright", and hung up.

Yulia heads
straight to a Moscow airport

but faces a two-hour delay

before the next flight
to Siberia.

I went to a cafe,

sat down,

and tears streamed
down my face.

Yulia Navalny
has been by Aleksei's side

for over 20 years

and is a public figure
in her own right.

In Russia we don't usually see

politicians' wives
on the stage at rallies.

But politics itself
breaks into families.

The couple met
on holiday in Turkey in 1998

and married two years later.

- I did not marry
a promising lawyer

and I did not marry
an opposition leader,

I married a young man
named Aleksei.

The Navalnys'
daughter, Dasha,

was born in 2001
and is now a student

at Stanford University
in America,

while their son, Zahar,

is at boarding school
in Germany.

Dasha was five when she was
asked in nursery school

where her dad works.

She said,
"My dad works at rallies."

And then when she was seven
she said,

"My dad fights crooks".

Yulia has supported
Aleksei through raids

on their apartment,

lawsuits and worse.

She's his closest confidante,
his best friend

and the one who packs
his bags

every time he goes to prison.

- She is absolutely part
of his journey,

both metaphorically,
physically, politically -

whichever way
you want to call it.

I share his beliefs

and fully imagine him
as President.

But I can't imagine myself
as First Lady.

I see myself as his wife,
whatever he becomes.

As Yulia waits
for her flight,

she knows Aleksei's life
hangs in the balance.

- The worst part was probably
boarding the plane.

The flight to Omsk
takes about four hours

and realising you're cut off
from all news for four hours...

..that was genuinely agonising.

While Yulia is in the air,

Navalny's YouTube channel

broadcasts a live phone
interview with Kira Yarmysh.

Aleksei is in a stable
but critical condition.

He is in a coma and on
artificial respiration

and as before there
is still no diagnosis,

but it's obvious that
he's been poisoned.

Russian state television

takes a rather different view
of his illness.

The blogger Aleksei Navalny
was hospitalised in Omsk today.

According to Tass
and RIA Novosti

he fell ill on a flight
from Tomsk to Moscow.

The suspected cause of
his illness is intoxication.

Yulia and Navalny's doctor,

Anastasia Vasilyeva,
finally get to Omsk,

but they're refused
permission to see Aleksei.

We approached a woman, a nurse,
who was acting like a guard dog.

She demanded that Yulia show her
their marriage certificate

and I produce
my medical qualifications.

I felt as though we had come up
against a brick wall

and a dying man behind that wall
needed our help.

After two agonising hours,

the authorities finally relent.

Seeing him I realised that

he's probably much worse
than I imagined.

The most terrifying thing was
to see Aleksei in a coma.

He had convulsions too.

It was like the film 'Alien'.

He'd arch his back.

It was terrifying.

- We were faced with this
absolutely insurmountable hurdle

and then with some
astonishingly absurd lies.

We naturally tried
to ask questions

but we received
some weird answers

about alcohol in his blood.

There's no poison
in his blood or urine.

No toxic chemicals or poisons

were found.

The official line
is that Navalny's illness

is due to low blood sugar
or possibly alcohol,

but Yulia
and Anastasia Vasilyeva

feel certain that the doctors
are hiding something.

Suddenly a woman from

the transport police
came into the office.

She showed
the Chief Medical Officer

something on her phone.

She said, "Look at
the substance we've found."

Her eyes were bulging with fear.

"This is really dangerous
for everyone here."

He glanced at her phone
and said,

"What are you showing me?

"This is just something
on your phone.

"Nothing's definite.
What is this nonsense?"

We think this is being done
so that...

..whatever chemical substance
is in Aleksei's body disappears.

They're not going to
let Aleksei leave

while traces
of the chemical remain.

He's in a bad way and we
can't trust this hospital.

We're asking them
to let us take him

to an independent hospital
with doctors we can trust.

Aleksei Navalny's road

to a hospital bed in Omsk

started in the last days
of the Soviet Union.

He was born in 1976 in
a small village near Moscow,

the son of an army officer,

and spent his childhood
summers with his grandmother,

beside the River Pripyat,

in the shadow of Chernobyl
nuclear power station.

- Russia's radioactivity
reaches Britain.

Soviet television tonight

accused the Western media

of spreading slanderous
inventions

about the Chernobyl accident.

But the Moscow
Communist Party chief

told West German television

that radioactivity around the
nuclear plant was still high.

He was ten
when the place became

a nuclear wasteland,

the result of Communist
inefficiency and lies.

- Navalny spent
every summer there,

swimming in the river,

which is the source
of radiation.

So there is a personal
connection there.

It's a symbol
of how dysfunctional

the Soviet Union is

and everything
that's wrong with it,

that lies cost lives.

At the time of Chernobyl,

Vladimir Putin was
a minor KGB spy in Dresden,

then part of East Germany.

But by the turn
of the millennium,

he'd become one of the most
powerful men in the world.

Today I am addressing you

because you have entrusted me

with the highest office
in the land.

Aleksei was just 23
when Putin became President.

To make those officials
elected by the people

work in the interest
of the people.

To defend Russian citizens
everywhere,

both in this country
and beyond our borders.

Russians had endured
nearly 10 years

of economic chaos
and corruption

since the collapse
of the Soviet Union.

Many now welcomed a new,
young president,

who promised strong
leadership,

even if he was
the ex-head of the KGB.

And he made friends
abroad as well.

I looked the man in the eye,

I found him
to be very straightforward

and trustworthy.

But some in Russia
were not so sure.

Journalist and academic
Yevgenia Albats

felt that he might not be

as committed to democracy
as he claimed.

Mostly, I was terrified

he will bring his power
from the KGB

and they will take over.

And eventually,

they will become the ones
who run the country.

It's not just one man
who was coming to power.

Albats set out to inspire

a new generation
of young activists,

with meetings
in her Moscow flat.

Yevgenia Albats gathered

very different young people

who endlessly debated

among themselves.

Tried out ideas,

sometimes argued.

There was an atmosphere
of vibrant political life,

and lively political discussion.

Navalny was included,
but failed to make

much of an impression.

- Aleksei Navalny
was not well known

in the democratic movement.

A lot of people would say
that he's a nice guy,

he's a great organiser,

but he doesn't have any
political future.

Russia without Putin!

Russia without Putin!

It was a prediction
that Navalny

quickly proved wrong.

We know how to turn
our political machine,

which we created at
these elections,

into a steam roller that will
crush the United Russia Party

and all the crooks and thieves

it has stuffed every
government position.

By 2012,

when Putin was elected
President for the third time,

Navalny
had moved successfully

from the virtual world to
the real world of protest.

We know why we are here.

Our votes have been stolen.

And we have come here to say
give us back what belongs to us.

A powerful orator,

he mobilised tens
of thousands in opposition

to Putin
and his United Russia Party.

This is our city!

- He tried to show
that this wasn't some

huge powerful character
in a big powerful country.

But that this was just
some random KGB officer

who had managed

to get into a position of power

and successfully entrench
himself there.

By focusing on corruption,

he tapped into
widespread discontent

and tried to convince
the Russian people

that change really was possible.

A party of crooks and thieves.
A party of crooks and thieves.

The party of crooks,
thieves and murderers.

Throughout 2012,

he continued
his transformation

from troublemaking YouTuber

to troublemaking
opposition politician.

Stop resisting
or I will break your arm.

I will put you in prison then.

Then in 2013,

he ran for Mayor of Moscow
and, incredibly,

almost forced a run off

against
the United Russia candidate,

President Putin's
former chief of staff.

He'd made himself
such a nuisance

that he had to be stopped.

In 2010,

Navalny had gone to study
at Yale University

in the United States.

His time there has been
used by the state

to paint him as a traitor
and a paid agent of the CIA.

Myself and Aleksei were at Yale
on the World Fellows Program,

along with 12, 13 other people,

who they identify as being

potential global leaders,
influencers.

There were two real challenges.

One would be that he was
being recruited by the CIA.

The other that's come out is
that he would himself be

accused of corruption.

They put together a fake set
of exchanges between

CIA agents or something,

where they would refer
to Navalny as Agent Freedom.

Anti-corruption activist
has to be transformed

into the agent of the enemy.

Navalny may be fighting
corruption,

but he is a hired gun
of the West,

to undermine our sovereignty.

And I think some people
by now honestly believe

this narrative within
the regime.

Detention centres
and court rooms

are great places for me.

Everybody loves me
and takes my picture.

As predicted
by his colleagues at Yale,

Navalny also became the focus
of police investigations

into corruption.

Navalny, Aleksei Anatolyevich.

- Your date of birth?
- June 4, 1976.

He was accused of stealing

half a million dollars
from a timber company.

Then, a year later,

both he and his brother Oleg,

were found guilty
of defrauding

a French cosmetics company.

- It's very advantageous
for Kremlin,

you know, when somebody
is fighting corruption

to say that
he's corrupt himself.

To really understand what was
going on takes a lot of time.

- The case
was brought against me

to push me out of politics.

So when people don't have
a lot of time, you know,

they make all kinds
of assumption.

Even though, legally,
there is nothing there.

Freedom for Navalny.
Jail for Putin.

The European Court
later found that,

in the first case,
Navalny didn't get a fair trial

and his conviction in the second
was arbitrary and unfair.

The political signal being
sent is the same as before.

This government of thieves
is saying,

"If you complain about us,
we'll put you in prison.

"And if you're not afraid
of going to prison,

"we will put your relatives
in prison."

Navalny's brother Oleg

served his full sentence

of three and a half years
in a penal colony,

while Aleksei was paroled
after a few weeks

on condition that he report

to Russia's prison
service twice a month.

Hello. I work with people a lot

and I notice our society
has a problem with decay.

More damaging to
his reputation as a liberal

are two videos
that Navalny himself made

in the mid-2000s.

One in support of gun
ownership...

Hello. Today we're
going to talk about

the fight against insects.

..and another
against immigration.

But what do you do
when a cockroach

is too big
or a fly is too strong?

In this case I recommend a gun.

The videos are ambiguous.

But I don't see
any crime in that.

Only people
who have got soft heads

think that nationalism
means violence.

You must understand
that it was 2007/08.

So we were all in
our political youth trying

our different styles
of political expression.

A tooth without a root is dead.

A nationalist is someone

who doesn't want Russia
to lose its roots.

We have the right to be
Russian in Russia,

and we are going to defend
that right.

He was naive at that time

and I think that this format
was a mistake

and I think it's still
haunting him.

He's not the same guy
as he was

when he was filming these videos

and I think we have to give him

the benefit of changing his mind

and, you know, being mistaken.

Navalny's
nationalist sympathies

also led him to march
alongside Neo Nazis,

so-called Russian Patriots,

and others on the right wing
fringe at several rallies.

- There's this endless
question with Navalny

about those nationalist views,

and there's some people
who have concerns

about them in good faith

and there's people
who have concerns about them

in bad faith.

I asked him about those videos

and he was quite clear that
he didn't regret them,

that they were not something
to be taken seriously,

but he was very clear,

he wasn't going to say
that they were a mistake.

The main doubt I had
was his nationalist views.

In those years he made some
troubling statements about

ethnic minorities in Russia
and the North Caucasus.

He participated
in the Russian March

which took place
in Moscow every year.

- I know him as a person
I made friends with.

We sat next to each other
in class,

we had lunch together,

we went on socials together.

Since then,

I hear people attempting to
pigeonhole him as xenophobic,

anti-immigrant, racist,

hostile and all these other
things.

There is always going to be
an attack on his character,

an attempt to discredit the work

he's been doing
to expose these frauds,

just like there was
attempts to charge him

with corruption a few years ago.

But even where he has said
things that are problematic,

my experience of him leaves
me with hope for him.

The Kremlin has capitalised

on Navalny's apparent racism

and extreme nationalism

and Amnesty International
at one point

suspended their support
for him.

But in August 2020,
as he lay in a coma in Omsk,

it was clear that
someone, somewhere,

had decided a more permanent
solution was required

to make the Navalny
problem go away.

Nuremberg Airport, Germany.

An air ambulance, paid for
by Navalny's supporters,

is on standby to fly
4,000km to Siberia.

But there's a problem -

the Kremlin
doesn't want Aleksei

to leave the country
just yet.

The team of medics
set off anyway,

hoping the Russians
can be persuaded.

From the tests that have
been carried out to date,

no poisons have been found
in his blood or urine.

At the moment we don't think
the patient has been poisoned.

In practical terms,
we have a full diagnosis.

I am sorry I can't tell
you what that is,

but his wife and brother
have been told.

Once in Siberia,

the German team
is told their patient

is too sick to travel.

The Russians, it seems,
are playing for time.

- We said, hey, look,
gentlemen, it would be great

if our team could visit
the patient,

could speak to you in person,

face-to-face,
discuss the situation,

show them our equipment,

to convince them let our team
go to the patient and see

if we can discuss it and see

if this could change
their minds of course.

At this point
there were no clinical reasons

why Herr Navalny could
not be flown out.

The problem was that
they didn't want it

to get out that
he had been poisoned.

They wanted the story
to change from poisoning

to "He's not fit to fly".

In the hospital,

Yulia is not allowed to speak
to the German doctors.

Whoever ordered
Navalny's poisoning

knows exactly
what is wrong with him.

But it appears that,
having messed up the murder,

they are now trying
to cover their tracks.

- Let his wife in.
Let his wife in.

The security services
and local police

are not allowing us to see
the German doctors.

We think they are being

told that they won't hand
Aleksei over.

When the German medics

are whisked away
to their hotel,

Yulia gives an impromptu
press conference.

- The German doctors
were brought in

through the back entrance.

They hid us away.

And you saw how the doctors

were taken out the other way
in their car.

I have clear information

all this is about stopping
Aleksei being released.

Aleksei Navalny
is the victim of a crime.

He was meant to be silenced.

I condemn this in
the strongest possible terms

in the name of the entire
German government.

Navalny is also
being talked about in Berlin.

There are very serious
questions that

only the Russian Government
can and must answer.

Aleksei Navalny's plight has
drawn worldwide attention.

The world waits for answers.

Two days after
he was stretchered,

dying, from an aeroplane,

Navalny is on the move again.

Vladimir Putin, it seems,
has relented,

and we reveal that
the crucial intervention

came from Finland.

- There was
a very significant

international pressure
applied

from French president Macron,
from Charles Michel,

the president
of the European Council,

and I think the final call,

which nailed it, was a call
from the Finnish president,

Sauli Niinistoö, who has, like,

a more or less trustful
relations with Putin.

Probably President Niinistoö
had found some right words

to persuade Putin
to avoid major scandal.

Still unsure

what's caused
Navalny's illness,

the aircrew are taking
no chances.

They put him
in a plastic case,

to make sure
whatever is on or in him

doesn't affect anyone else.

Exactly what that
is remains a mystery.

In Germany,

a convoy carries Navalny
to the Charité Hospital

in Berlin.

Blood and urine samples
are sent for analysis

to various laboratories
around Europe,

and the mystery poison
is finally identified.

It is a form of Novichok,

the banned chemical weapon
infamously used

against Yulia and Sergei Skripal

in Salisbury, England,
in 2018.

- I believe we have a duty to
get to the bottom of this.

It is completely correct
for Germany

to say we are willing
to do this.

Russian state television

has a very different way

of presenting the latest
instalment of the drama

to its viewers.

Chancellor Merkel has accused
us of poisoning him

with the chemical weapon,
Novichok.

Listen,
we sent Navalny to Germany

with no Novichok in his system.

The poison was discovered
when he was in Germany.

Germany must explain
how a Russian citizen

was poisoned on German soil.

While accusations
fly around the world,

Navalny is still in a coma.

But miraculously,
just over two weeks later,

his condition
has improved so much

that his doctors decide
to bring him round.

I was in a coma for 18 days.
18 days on strong drugs.

So I've experienced half death,
then coma,

and then these narcotics.

The hallucinations
and the whole drug trip

were by far the worst.

This professor came in
and we talked.

At some point I looked up
and said,

without using the nicest
language,

"What the fuck is going
on here?"

He said, "That's when
I knew you'd be OK".

Navalny leaves hospital

after just four
and a half weeks,

but he is struggling to walk,
his hands shake,

and he's constantly exhausted.

A month later, he appears
on American television.

It's clear his spirit
is unbroken.

We should fight these people

because they will never stop.

They will poison someone else,
they will poison more people.

As he heads to the
Black Forest to recuperate,

attention turns
to who tried to kill him.

The revelations that
eventually emerge

are astonishing.

A secret poison lab,

a state-sponsored
assassination programme,

and a team
of James Bond wannabes

with the competence
of Johnny English.

You will not see us run.

You will not see us hide.

You will not see us give up.

This is our country.
We have to fight for it.

While Navalny
recovers in Germany,

Vladimir Kara-Murza
knows exactly

what he's going through.

An outspoken critic of Putin,

he has twice been the victim
of suspected poisoning.

- I suddenly felt
difficulty breathing,

my heart began to race.

I felt
my blood pressure drop.

I began to sweat,
I began to vomit.

It's painful and terrifying,
to be feeling

that you are dying
at this moment

and to not be able
to breathe.

And after that,
I don't remember anything

for more than a month.

Like Navalny,
Kara-Murza survived,

but he knows he is one
of the lucky ones.

- It's a strange
statistical model,

that people who happen
to oppose

the regime
of Vladimir Putin...

..happen to just walk into
these strange accidents

and suffer
from really bad health

and just be really not
careful with what they do

and how
they live their lives.

There is
a long list of victims.

Journalist
Anna Politkovskaya,

shot on her doorstep.

Whistle-blower
Sergei Magnitsky,

dead after
a beating in prison.

Defector
Alexander Litvinenko,

poisoned in London
with polonium-210,

served to him
in a cup of tea.

Politician Sergei Yushenkov,
shot dead near his house.

And there are many more who
have perished suddenly

or had lucky escapes.

- Putin has made it
very clear

that he thinks traitors
don't deserve to live

and we have seen people
he considers to be traitors,

like Alexander Litvinenko
or Sergei Skripal, you know,

the denials that
they've had anything

to do with those murders,

those attempted murders
in the case of Skripal,

they have been sort
of almost denials

with a bit of a wink
and a nod.

The Russian state media

alleged that
Litvinenko himself

was illegally trading
in polonium

and accidentally
swallowed it.

When Viktor Yushchenko,

the Ukrainian presidential
candidate,

suffered a horrible
poisoning,

Russian state television
said that he ate bad sushi.

With me,
it was too much alcohol

in combination
with some medicines.

With Aleksei Navalny,
it was low blood sugar.

Every time, the Kremlin
and its propaganda machine

immediately starts
to throw out

these "alternative"
explanations.

They immediately start
to muddy the waters.

One assassination

that hit Aleksei Navalny
particular hard

was the murder in 2015

of his political mentor,
Boris Nemtsov.

Nemtsov had been
the Deputy Prime Minister

in the '90s,

but fell out with Putin
and joined the opposition.

My father
and Navalny got closer.

There was one moment
when they found themselves

locked in one prison cell

and they spent
the whole night together,

talking to each other.

They've taken away my phones
illegally.

- My father was
a political visionary.

He was very experienced
as a politician.

The top-dog Putin is grasping
for power again.

He was a...

..person who united
opposition leaders

because he didn't have
personal ambitions.

That's what many other
opposition leaders

later admitted -

he was like a unifying figure
in the Russian opposition.

In February 2015,

Nemtsov was walking home over
the Bolshoy Moskvoretsky Bridge,

within sight of the Kremlin,
in central Moscow.

Despite the site's strategic
importance,

all CCTV cameras in the area

had conveniently
been turned off.

But a distant view
from a local TV station

captured the hit.

As a truck draws up
alongside him,

a gunman shoots Nemtsov
in the back

before making his getaway
in the circled car.

- I went to bed
at around 11 o'clock,

and I had a habit to switch
off all my smartphones,

not to be disturbed.

My mother, for some reason,

did not do that
on this night.

In the midnight,

I heard her crying
and yelling,

and I didn't understand
what had happened.

And then she came to my room
and she said, er...

"Our father is dead."

This was the most brazen,

the most high-profile
political assassination

in the modern history of
Russia and to this day,

the organisers,
the masterminds of this crime

continue to enjoy
full protection

from the highest levels
of the Russian state,

for reasons that
I think are obvious

to everyone
who is watching this.

- He mentioned that
he could be killed,

but I don't believe that
he believed in it, really.

He thought like that, "I was
in the government in the '90s,

"I'm one of the most
high-profile politicians

"in Russia. It's impossible."

- This action was aimed
at frightening us all

to shut us up
and make us censor ourselves

so that we would be
too afraid to speak up.

This was the point
of that murder.

They chose the target
very precisely.

Whoever ordered
Nemtsov's murder

has never been identified.

And five years later,

as Navalny recovers from
the Novichok attack

in the Black Forest,

it looks as if
whoever poisoned him

is also going to get away
with it.

But Bellingcat,

a loose alliance
of citizen journalists,

founded in a bedroom
in Leicester,

has other ideas.

Bellingcat has
an incredible record

of solving global whodunnits.

It tracked the Russian
missile launcher

that brought down
flight MH17 over Ukraine,

and named
the Salisbury poisoners,

identifying them
as Russian spies.

As Navalny recuperates,

its researchers are piecing
together the evidence

to stand up
a sensational accusation.

The big picture that
we got was that, yes,

a murder machine exists
in Russia and it is killing,

or trying to kill, many people,

and the question is - how many?

Following on
from its investigation

into the Salisbury poisoning
of the Skripals,

the Bellingcat team found

a secret Russian
chemical weapons plant

called the Signal Institute.

With mobile phone records

bought on
the Russian black market,

they discovered links between
senior staff there

and a team within Russia's
secret police, the FSB.

The FSB has this
scary second service

which is the equivalent
of Hitler's Gestapo.

It is essentially
the political police

that goes after
opposition figures.

We had just completed
an investigation

into the Signal Institute,

which we found continued
to engage in production

and upgrading
of chemical weapons.

And what we started doing
then was looking at metadata

and call logs of people

at the top of this
scientific institute,

and trying to find if there
is any interconnection

with somebody from the FSB.

- This information is
important in two ways.

First of all, of course,

we understand that this
person speaks with another

and we can link two different
agents together.

And through GPS, we see where
this person is located.

And we found that one of

the most frequent counterparts
of the scientific institute guy

from the FSB side
was communicating

frequently with five people

that have a chemical weapons
background

or a medical background,

or a chemical engineering
background.

Then we started tracing
their travel.

And we found that there
had been

significant overlaps between
their travel and destinations

that Aleksei Navalny
had travelled to.

At the outset,

we found three or four
overlaps and we thought,

well, this could still
be a coincidence.

By tracking their flights

and using facial recognition
software,

they found that members
of the team

were travelling under
fake names

and several
were using passports

with consecutive
serial numbers,

a giveaway that they were
produced in a batch

by the FSB.

- We delved further
and deeper

and we found a total
of more than 35 overlaps

and then we thought,
OK, well,

this cannot be
a coincidence.

This must be the team that
has been tailing him,

and this could not be just
a political surveillance team

because a political
surveillance team

would not include a doctor,

a chemical engineer

and a chemical weapons
specialist.

Either they were creating
a pattern of his movements

so that they can plan

an assassination operation
when needed,

or they were always
on standby,

waiting for
a political decision

from somebody high up,
who might have decided, hmm,

now is the time because he
becomes a risk or a danger.

The Bellingcat investigators

then discovered
a direct connection

between the FSB poison team

and Navalny's last journey,
to Tomsk.

- One of the FSB unit,
Alexandrov,

he switched on his cellphone
for only one second in Tomsk.

I think he was just changing
his SIM card,

because he wanted
to work secretly.

But he didn't know that even
if you turn on your phone,

it's enough to send one byte
of information

to your telephone operator.

Bellingcat's
painstaking research

has found enough
evidence left behind

by the would-be assassins to
prove beyond reasonable doubt

that there is a team
of chemical killers

stalking Navalny.

And the man
who invented Novichok

tells us why
it's their weapon of choice.

This is Shikhany,

a closed military town
1,000km southeast of Moscow.

It's been a centre

for chemical weapons
research for decades.

British intelligence
believes the Novichok

used on the Skripals
in Salisbury

was manufactured here.

It might even have been made
by this man.

- I'm Vladimir Uglev,
born in 1946.

In 1975 I discovered
the new compound

which is now known as Novichok.

This was the chemical used

to poison the Skripals
in England.

Uglev's knowledge
of how Novichok works

meant that he recognised
Navalny's symptoms

long before lab tests proved

it was the poison used on him.

A person first feels fear,

then they start to sweat
and the symptoms build.

He began to sweat
and shake at the same time,

and he fell into a coma
almost immediately.

And so I concluded that

it definitely was one
of the Novichok agents.

Uglev thinks
that the Russians

have secretly made his original
invention more deadly.

- They used a special form of it
for the attack on Navalny.

This was developed more recently

when I wasn't working
there anymore.

This suggests Russia
has not only been violating

international chemical
weapons treaties

by storing
and using old nerve agents,

it's also been covertly
developing new poisons

as part of its
assassination programme.

Uglev also believes he knows

how the Novichok
was administered.

As soon as Navalny's team
in Tomsk

got news of his collapse,

they went to his hotel room
to collect anything

that might be evidence
of foul play

and sent it to Germany.

Novichok was later found

on the outside
of a water bottle,

but not in the water.

Uglev knows why.

It must be put directly
onto the skin,

which wasn't possible,
or given in food,

but then he would have died
literally in minutes.

So how do you do it?

The only way
is to put it on something

that belongs just to him.

Something no-one other than
he or his wife would handle.

So that would be his underpants.

A secret chemical weapon...

..poisoned underpants,

and a crack team of assassins.

What could possibly go wrong?

It's six weeks before
Putin's poisoners

very nearly kill Navalny
in Siberia,

and Yulia and Aleksei
have decided

they need a summer holiday.

What better romantic getaway
can there be

than a week in the Baltic
resort of Kaliningrad?

Coincidentally,

three FSB secret agents
have exactly the same idea

and book a vacation
to the same destination

at the same time.

Even hit men deserve
a break now and again.

- Are these people
not just secret agents

but also secret members
of my family?

Three days
into their holiday,

the Navalnys are walking
along the beach

when Yulia starts
to feel unwell.

We sat down in a cafe,

and I decided
not to order any food

but just have something
to drink,

because I was feeling
really awful.

Aleksei ordered something,
but then I started feeling

so sick that I decided
not to wait for him

and go back to our room
on my own.

As I made my way through
the park, I felt so terrible

that I had to sit down
on a bench a couple of times

and even lean against a tree
to stop myself falling over.

By the next morning,
Yulia had recovered,

so we'll never know if this
was just some bad sushi

or if the three men who were
following the Navalnys -

all with chemical weapons
expertise -

had made a botched attempt
to kill Aleksei

and almost poisoned Yulia.

- We cannot be 100% sure
that that's what happened,

but what we do see
is that the team was there

exactly on the time
when she fell ill,

and that immediately after that,

there was a spike of phone calls

between this team and people

at the Signal Institute,

which produces Novichok.

They've been following me
for three and a half years.

They tried to poison me
at least three times.

But I'm still alive.

At this point
it is appropriate to ask

the question
that's in everyone's head.

"What kind of helpless idiots
work in the FSB?"

The Bellingcat dossier

shows that
a chemical weapons hit squad

had been following
Navalny for years.

But what is it about
the summer of 2020

that makes someone, somewhere,

decide that Aleksei Navalny
must die?

The March to Freedom,

attended by tens
of thousands today.

This was a remarkable display

of people power without fear.

Nine days before
Navalny's poisoning, Minsk,

the capital of the former
Soviet republic of Belarus,

was in turmoil.

700km east of Moscow,
and not even part of Russia,

Belarus has been ruled
for the last 25 years

by a man many call
Europe's last dictator,

Alexander Lukashenko.

As he sought a sixth term
in office in 2020,

an opposition movement seemed
to appear out of nowhere.

Its figurehead was

a previously unknown
English teacher,

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya.

I am tired of being patient.
I am tired of being silent.

I am tired of being afraid.
And you?

Are you tired of being patient?

For decades,
Putin watched and supported

Belarus's oppressive
throwback to Soviet rule.

Could his reaction
to the protests

have sealed Navalny's fate?

- What happened in Belarus
may be a coincidence,

but certainly I think there
was probably a feeling

that when you have
latent discontent,

having any outlet
to express it is dangerous.

And a charismatic politician,

with a network
of dedicated campaigners

in cities across the country,

if he is someone that,
at the crisis moment,

pops up and is offering
an alternative,

I think that's very dangerous.

For the past week,

this country
has been the latest arena

in the tussle between
autocracy and democracy.

As the protesters in Belarus

threatened to topple
their leader,

the question in the Kremlin
of what to do about Navalny

became increasingly urgent.

I think that Vladimir Putin

believed that this is a very,
very likely possibility.

And he understood that,
of course,

Navalny would be the person

who would bring hundreds
of thousands of people

in Russia to the streets.

The revolution
is in seductive mode.

And who knows if the
soldiers' awkward blushes

will translate into
a failure to fire?

- They were hugely unnerved
by the protests.

And he saw it as an omen

of similar things
coming to Russia.

So, the connections were
not hard to build.

With Navalny
on his way to Siberia,

the order went out
to eliminate

Putin's turbulent tormentor.

But ultimately,

the quick decisions
of a pilot,

who wasn't in on the plot,
and paramedics,

who were just trying
to save a life,

led to yet another
botched assassination.

And from his German retreat,
Navalny -

armed with Bellingcat's
research -

begins to taunt Putin
and his team of poisoners.

Hi, it's Navalny.

I know who wanted to kill me.

I know where they live,
I know where they work.

I know their real names.
I know their fake names.

I have their photographs.

- It's one thing to understand
something intellectually,

as it were,

and it's quite another to be
shown the faces and names

of the actual people
who tried to kill me.

I was looking at
the photographs,

and I was seeing just normal,
ordinary faces -

you know,
the kind that I would see

here on the streets of Moscow
every single day.

And yet these people
are professional murderers

in the employment of the state.

I was thinking to myself,

"What do these people
talk about

"at the family dinner table?"

What do their kids
ask them about?

"How many people
did you poison today, Daddy"?

It's mind-boggling.

We enter a rundown
apartment building

on the outskirts of Moscow

where operative
Oleg Tayakin lives.

With the help of
Bellingcat and Navalny,

a journalist from CNN
decides to track down

one of the alleged assassins.

My name's Clarissa Ward.
I work for CNN.

Can I ask you a couple
of questions?

No surprise that Mr Tayakin

didn't want to chat.

But his boss, the president,
was more forthcoming.

Now, as far as that patient

in a Berlin clinic
is concerned...

..if we had wanted to poison
him,

we would certainly have
finished the job.

- He admitted that
there had been

FSB people tailing Navalny.

Interestingly enough,
he also said,

"If we had tried to poison him,

"we would have finished
the job,"

which is one of the most
shocking things

to come from a head of state,

because he did not even
try to argue that

"We don't kill people."

He just said,

"If we want to kill people,
we do it properly."

As 2020 draws to a close,

Navalny has another surprise
lined up for the president.

Hi. It's Navalny.

I've said that
this whole poisoning story

is cooler than
a Hollywood movie.

And you have no idea
how true that is.

In a classic detective story,
there's always a scene

where the killer confesses.

And we have it too.

It's just incredible.

Navalny's newest video
blows apart Putin's claim

that if the FSB
had been involved,

they'd have done
the job properly

and Aleksei would be dead.

Navalny calls up
one of the team

involved in the poisoning,

posing as the assistant

to one of Putin's
most senior advisers.

Konstantin?

Hello.

- Konstantin Borisovich?
- Yes, yes.

Hello, my name
is Maxim Sergeevich Ustinov,

I'm an assistant of
Nikolai Platonovich Patrushev.

Vladimir Mikhailovich Bogdanov
gave me your phone number.

I'm sorry for an early call

but I really need 10 minutes
of your time.

I'm making a report
for Nikolai Platonovich.

This will be discussed
at the highest levels

of the Security Council.

We took the simplest programme
used by phone pranksters.

It hid the number
I was calling from

and substituted the number
we wanted instead.

You see a familiar number,

pick up the phone
and start talking.

What went wrong?

What caused the total failure
regarding Navalny in Tomsk?

We did everything as
we discussed many times before.

That's my opinion.

As for the rest,

we only act when we get
the go-ahead from our bosses.

Konstantin Borisovich
Kudryavtsev,

a military chemist from

the FSB's Forensic
Science Institute.

He previously worked at
the Ministry of Defence.

He talked to me for 45 minutes.

Maximum secrecy
is a top priority

to avoid any chance of someone
getting caught on camera.

You understand?

I understand.

For a long time, I thought,

"There's no way that
this guy wouldn't have

"recognised Aleksei's voice.

"There's no way that
he's not fooling us."

Probably at any
given moment in time,

we will have the FSB break
down the door

in this German house
we were in and just kill us.

You miscalculated the dosage
and the probabilities, why?

As far as I know,

everything was calculated
with a margin.

Events went against us.

Had it taken a bit longer,

everything would have gone
completely different.

Had what taken longer,
Konstantin Borisovich?

Konstantin Borisovich?

His flight - had his flight
taken a bit longer?

I think so, yes.

And then I thought, "Well,
this is real, this is happening.

"The guy really thinks

he's talking
to the aide to the boss."

And he's spilling
the beans in real time.

OK, could you tell me what
clothing did you focus on?

Where could the maximum
concentration be found?

Well, the underpants.

The underpants?

Yes, the underpants.

Which part of the underpants?

- Well, we focused on
the inner seams.

Those were the parts we treated.

- Hold on, I'm writing down
"inner seams of the underpants."

OK, so what was the colour?

They were dark blue.

Dark blue.

It was just unbelievable.

I mean,
I assume it's the first time

in the history of criminality

that the alleged murderers
actually admitted to the victim

that they tried to kill him,

describing exactly
how they did it

and where they put the Novichok.

Let's sum up what we
have one more time.

So, you think that
this subject survived

because they landed the plane
too quickly?

Is that the main reason?

Had they taken a bit longer,

everything would have
ended differently.

Like me and you, we thought
Russian secret services

are professional
and they're scary.

The underpants story
created a stream of memes

that make fun of the Kremlin,
but also of secret services,

and equate them with
underpants washers,

underpants cleaners,
underpants poisoners.

And this is probably
the worst damage

done to
the Russian secret services

that I have seen in my career.

I apparently became
the first person in history

whose underpants were discussed

at the Security Council
of Russia

or wherever Putin plans his
most important operations.

After Navalny throws

his latest YouTube
custard pie at Putin

from the relative safety
of Germany,

people start to wonder

if he'll ever return
to Russia.

Some of his supporters
want him to stay in the West,

part of the ever-expanding
Russian opposition-in-exile.

But on the 13th of January,
2021,

Navalny ends
the speculation -

he's going home.

- I challenged him
whether that was smart,

whether that was expedient,

and he said it
doesn't matter.

He said,
I have to return to Russia

because the alternative means

soon I will be just an emigre

who's just yelling at Russia.

I need to be where
my followers are.

I need to be there.

- He's a man who does stuff
that is right for his country.

And then suddenly he stays
in Germany

and hides under a bench?
That's not Aleksei.

- You can't be involved in
Russian politics

and not be in Russia.

You can't ask
people to attend rallies

if you don't share
the risk with them.

Navalny understood this
perfectly.

Russia is his country,
Moscow is his city.

His family is here at
the end of the day.

And so is his team.

Aleksei and Yulia

board a flight to Moscow.

The plane is packed
with journalists.

The master of social media
is stage managing his return

for maximum impact.

- I would like to say great
thanks to Germany and to you.

I hope we will complete
our flight

and I am sure everything
will be absolutely great.

He's even chosen
a Russian airline called Pobeda,

meaning 'victory'.

Seated a few rows behind
the Navalnys

is Arkady Ostrovsky.

- I knew this was
a big political act.

It was no ordinary flight
and, with real history,

you sensed it was happening
there and then.

It's a flight carrying him
back into politics

and turning him into sort of
a mythical figure.

Bring us some vodka.
We are going home.

Hundreds of supporters

gather at Moscow's
Vnukovo Airport

to welcome their hero home.

But at the last moment,

the flight is diverted to
another airport

where a rather different
group is waiting for him.

- If you refuse to obey
the police...

What instruction?

- To follow me
to the police station.

Just say, "I am detaining you

"because you are on
the wanted list".

He's arrested
as he clears passport control

and spirited away
to a police station.

He's charged with violating

the terms of his parole
from 2014

by not reporting immediately
to the authorities in Russia

on his discharge from
hospital in Germany.

First of all, this person knew

that he was breaking
Russian law.

I want to stress that,
deliberately ignoring the law,

this gentleman went abroad
for treatment.

He was not required by the
authorities to register then.

But as soon as he left hospital

and posted his videos
on the internet,

then he was required
to register.

With Navalny behind bars

and facing
a lengthy prison sentence,

Putin seems to be holding
all the aces.

But Aleksei still has
at least one more card

up his sleeve,

and it's something
Vladimir Putin

will never forget or forgive.

Awaiting trial

inside one

of Russia's toughest prisons,

Matrosskaya Tishina,

some people would be cowed.

Not Aleksei Navalny.

Via his lawyers,

he greenlights the release of
his most audacious video yet.

His team have been secretly
working on it for months.

All of this was done to avoid

being detected by the police
or the FSB.

We changed tickets,
got off at the wrong stops,

changed SIM cards,
changed phones.

- Navalny is about to be
sent away for a long time,

and he lobs this missile attack
at the Kremlin from behind bars.

Hi, this is Navalny.

We began this investigation
when I was in intensive care

but we agreed to only
release it once

I was back home in Moscow
so that the hero of this film

wouldn't say
I was so frightened of him,

that I would only reveal
his scariest secret from abroad.

In 10 days, the film -
'Putin's Palace' -

racks up over 100 million views.

By February,
it's been seen by a quarter

of Russia's adult population.

It combines biting satire
with forensic investigation,

in a direct attack
on Vladimir Putin.

In this country there is
a single irreplaceable monarch -

Putin.

For many people across Russia,
this was like a big eye-opener.

It reveals the existence

of a secret palace
on the Black Sea

that allegedly belongs
to the Russian President.

Putin, for years,

has maintained
this ascetic image, you know,

like he only works
for Russia 24/7

and he doesn't care
about riches,

material things, you know?

- If you want to know how
much Putin's palace cost,

the accounts of the palace
and the vineyards

show 35 billion roubles
.

This is a church, it doesn't
look particularly orthodox.

On the right are two
helicopter landing pads.

That's strange as there
used to be three.

But they got rid of one

to make an underground
ice hockey pitch.

- Putin's approval rating
has a six percentage-point dip

in three, four weeks
after the movie was released.

Here are actual pieces of
furniture from Putin's palace.

This leather sofa -
2 million roubles .

People actually realised

that this is essentially
a maniac

preoccupied with luxury.

As damaging as the
revelations of personal greed

are the details about
the palace itself.

Gold toilet brushes
worth 700 euros each,

a retractable stripper pole

and a room for playing
with toy cars.

Putin became a joke.

Up until then,
he was always scary.

Now he was ridiculous.

You can't rewind history.

In people's minds,
Putin is now a little man

who plays with toy cars
in his hookah bar.

He became pitiful
and ridiculous.

That's how he will be forever.

The film questions

not just Putin's greed
but his sanity.

I really want to know how
an ordinary Soviet officer

became a maniac
crazy about money and luxury.

Not just crazy but ready
to destroy his country

and murder for the sake
of his chest of gold.

Putin denies he has
any connection to the palace,

let alone owns it.

Then, at the end
of January 2021,

his former judo sparring
partner,

the oligarch Arkady Rotenberg,

steps forward to claim
that it's his.

- Now it will no longer be
a secret. I own it.

There was a complicated
arrangement.

There were a lot of creditors.

But I managed to become
the owner.

It's a great find
and a wonderful place.

With just two weeks to go

before Navalny is due
in court for sentencing,

this deliberate baiting
of Putin

seems calculated to ensure
he will become a martyr.

Far away from the excess
of Putin's palace,

the next scene in the battle

between Navalny
and the Kremlin

plays out in a dingy
Moscow courtroom.

- He systematically violated
the conditions of his parole

repeatedly and without
a valid reason.

He did not register
on the required days

after treatment in hospital
from Aug 20th to Sept 23rd.

The outcome
is never in doubt.

Navalny is sentenced to three
and a half years in prison

for failing to comply with
the terms of his parole.

Before he's led away,

he makes
an impassioned speech

that's secretly recorded,

mocking his would-be
assassins and their master.

There was
Alexander the Liberator

and Yaroslav the Wise.

Now we have Vladimir the
Underpants Poisoner.

I am fighting as best I can
and I will keep fighting.

Even though I'm now under
the control of people

who love to smear things
with chemical weapons.

He saves his final
gesture for his wife, Yulia.

- There is always this
double optic with Navalny.

He is talking to the nation,

he is talking to all
his supporters.

But actually, he is talking
and addressing himself

to Yulia Navalnaya.

And then they are separated

and he is standing behind

the bulletproof glass
in this cage,

and he makes the heart symbol
with his hands.

Navalny is moved
to Pokrov Penal Colony No 2,

100km east of Moscow.

It's one of Russia's
harshest prisons.

Konstantin Kotov spent
four long years here,

sentenced for taking part
in political rallies.

Typically you get up at 6am.

You go outside
and everyone listens

to the national anthem.

You have to stand still with
your hands behind your back.

You can't turn your head
or talk to anyone.

You stand there listening to
the anthem like a soldier.

The roll call can take
an hour or more.

So you stand still for an hour
in the cold or the heat.

This is physically really hard.

Navalny gets
Instagram messages

out to his supporters
through his lawyers.

But as the prison regime
takes its toll,

the effects of the Novichok

mean his health
starts to fail.

The authorities refuse
to take him to hospital.

He spends 24 days
on hunger strike,

demanding better health care.

Why can't they simply put him
in hospital,

run tests and consult
with qualified doctors?

Do you know why
they won't do that?

I will tell you.

They didn't do it in Omsk
for the same reason.

It's because the nerve damage
is caused by a toxic chemical.

He almost certainly is suffering
from toxic nerve damage.

- What we see now is that
he's in jail with

a seriously deteriorating
medical condition.

Some of the symptoms we see
are neurological symptoms.

He doesn't feel his right leg.

He cannot control the muscles
of his right leg.

But because
the Russian authorities

refuse to recognise he was
poisoned in the first place,

doctors are not even allowed
to take

that previous poisoning
into account

when they are diagnosing
what's wrong with him now.

And this itself is criminal
and can be fatal.

The months since
Navalny's imprisonment

have seen Russia face
deepening oppression.

In June, Navalny's
anti-corruption foundation,

Fond Borby s Korruptsiyey,

was designated
an extremist organisation,

making it equivalent
to Al-Qaeda and ISIS.

Supporting Navalny in any way
can now get you arrested.

His allies had hoped
to use tactical voting

to beat Putin's party,
United Russia,

in September's elections.

Now, they're just hoping
to stay out of prison.

After Navalny was sent to
prison,

it was obvious the situation
would deteriorate.

The only thing we didn't know
was how fast it would happen.

Now it is a really bad time.

Over the course
of making this film,

our contributors have been
outlawed and imprisoned.

In Tomsk, Ksenia Fadeeva
has been arrested twice

and had her computers seized.

Roman Dobrokhotov's home
was raided by the police,

and he was taken in
for questioning.

Vladimir Milov has chosen
to go into exile in Latvia.

Kira Yarmysh was put under
nightly house arrest

and has now gone into exile
in Finland.

Politician Ilya Yashin
has been barred

from contesting future
elections.

Dr Anastasia Vasilyeva
was arrested on September 1.

And in Moscow,
police have used hacked data

to find and question

Navalny's
low-level supporters,

rounding them up in
alphabetical order.

Though they are both children
of the Soviet Union,

Vladimir Putin
and Aleksei Navalny

have radically
opposing visions

for Russia and its place
in the world.

- Putin is the product
of the security services.

This is a man with
the mind of a KGB agent.

Navalny is the complete
opposite of Putin.

Navalny is a free man
who has never worn a uniform.

Putin doesn't see Russia as
a player on the global stage.

He sees Russia as
a fortress under siege.

Navalny sees Russia as
a player on the global stage.

The poisoning
and imprisonment

of Aleksei Navalny

means Vladimir Putin
appears to have won.

Navalny's organisation
has been reduced to rubble.

And yet the attempt
to destroy Navalny

has drawn the eyes of the world

to Putin's
most persistent critic.

- We know from
Russia's own history

that major political change
usually comes like this -

suddenly and unexpectedly.

And I myself am old enough
to remember that no-one

at the beginning
of August of 1991

predicted that the Soviet regime

would not exist
by the end of the month

and that one

of the most repressive

and horrific
totalitarian systems

in the history of humanity

will go down in three days.

This is how things

happen in Russia.

None of us can tell
exactly when or how

political change
is going to come.

The only thing we know
is that it will -

because nothing is forever.

And Vladimir Putin is not

going to be an exception.

His regime is not going to be

an exception.

Both Vladimir Putin
and Aleksei Navalny

want to be remembered as the man

who defined
21st-century Russia.

Only one of them can succeed.

Aleksei Navalny will become

President of
the Russian Federation.

He will become the leader
who is going to turn Russia

back on its democratic path.

On an aeroplane
one morning in August 2020,

Aleksei Navalny stared death
in the face.

He has survived...for now.

I think it's a good thing.

It's very useful
for a politician

maybe facing death once.

Maybe ironically,

I became kind of more human
after this facing death.