Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said that Alexei Navalny’s phone call with a suspected FSB agent discussing his poisoning was a “provocation” carried out with help from foreign security services.

In a statement to Russian news agencies, the FSB described the call “about the alleged actions against” Navalny as a “planned provocation aimed at discrediting the FSB”, adding that the phone conversation would not have been possible without the “support of foreign special services”.

It added that a video of Navalny conducting the conversation was “fake”.