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Russian opposition politician Alexey Navalny survived an assassination attempt in summer after being poisoned with the nerve agent Novichok. He, as well as most Western nations, have blamed Russian security forces.

But with no new leads and no-one investigating, Mr Navalny decided to try to find proof himself, with the help of the Bellingcat investigative website. The website had already identified the team which had been trailing Navalny, so he phoned one of them up and pretended to be a senior security official investigating the poisoning operation.

Remarkably, it worked - and an agent identified as Konstantin Kudryavtsev spoke openly about the details of the attempt to kill him - even revealing that the toxin was planted in his underpants.

The Russian security service, the FSB, has said the entire phone conversation and associated video is a fake created by Western secret services.

The man who sat next to Alexey Navalny during this phone conversation, Christo Grozev, is lead investigator of Bellingcat. He says the story has gained traction in Russia, particularly via Telegram:

"In the call you hear that the FSB sent two teams to Omsk, where the hospital is, in order to wash Navalny's underpants of any traces. So now the new meme is 'we don't know who Navalny is, but Putin washes his underpants'"

(Photo: Screenshot of video of Navalny making his phone call. Credit: Navalny.com via Reuters)

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