The Investigative Committee said Monday that leftist opposition activist Leonid Razvozzhayev, who claims he was kidnapped by Russian security forces in Kiev in October and returned to Moscow for questioning, actually arrived back in Moscow by taxi.
Razvozzhayev is currently being held in a Siberian prison and faces charges of plotting to incite mass riots, theft, and illegally leaving Russia.
"He took a taxi to the [Russia-Ukraine] border," Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin told Interfax on Monday. "He got out, went through passport control while the car also crossed the border, and then got in the same car and travelled in it right up to Moscow."
While officials have always maintained that Razvozzhayev turned himself in, colleagues, friends and lawyers of the Left Front activist say that he was abducted by masked men in Kiev in October and spirited across the border into Russia.
Razvozzhayev himself has said that he was forced to sign a document stating he surrendered voluntarily.
Markin added that Razvozzhayev illegally entered Ukraine last year using his brother's passport.
On Sunday Razvozzhayev completed his prison transfer to Angarsk, a town in the Irkutsk region. He was moved by the authorities to aid investigators who are looking into an alleged theft of 500 hats from a fur trader 15 years ago.
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