A German hospital says it has discharged a member of the Russian protest group Pussy Riot after he made significant progress in his recovery from suspected poisoning.
The Charite hospital said that Pyotr Verzilov was discharged on Wednesday. He arrived in the German capital in mid-September after initial treatment in Moscow.
Mr Verzilov and other members of the Pussy Riot group served 15-day jail sentences for disrupting the World Cup final in Moscow in July to protest excessive Russian police powers.
German doctors treating Mr Verzilov have said reports that he was poisoned are “highly plausible”, but stressed they cannot say how this might have occurred or who was responsible.
Mr Verzilov fell ill on September 11 after attending a friend’s court hearing in the Russian capital, and was admitted to a Moscow hospital that evening with symptoms that included disorientation and widened pupils.
Russian doctors suspected possible poisoning and treated him accordingly, emptying his stomach and performing a dialysis, German doctors say.
The Charite’s Dr Kai-Uwe Eckardt said the diagnosis of an anticholinergic syndrome has not changed, and “an intake or absorption of an exogenous substance as the cause of this syndrome still appears to be the most plausible explanation for his acute illness on September 11”.
Tests during his stay at the hospital have produced no indications of another cause, Dr Eckardt added.
Charite’s chairman, Dr Karl Max Einhaeupl, added that tests so far have not produced any clear indication of a specific substance that might have caused his illness.
He said the Berlin hospital remains in contact with its Moscow counterparts to get more information on Mr Verzilov’s initial treatment.
