Russian Activist Kara-Murza Released From Hospital, Leaves Country

Vladimir Kara-Murza Jr.

Russian opposition political figure Vladimir Kara-Murza Jr. has been released from a Moscow hospital and has traveled abroad for further medical treatment following a suspicious illness he believes might have been a poisoning.

Kara-Murza and his wife, Yevgenia, left Russia on February 19, according to a post on social media by attorney Vadim Prokhorov. The post did not say where the couple was going.

Kara-Murza, 35, fell ill in Moscow on February 2 and spent several days in a medically induced coma.

(Kara-Murza's lawyer posted this on Facebook.)

His symptoms were almost identical to those he suffered during a near-fatal illness in 2015 that he believes was a deliberate poisoning in retaliation for his political activities.

Kara-Murza is a coordinator for the Open Russia nongovernmental organization, which is funded by former oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky. He was a close colleague of opposition political activist Boris Nemtsov, who was shot dead outside the Kremlin in February 2015.

With reporting by Interfax