A former official with the Russian Olympic Committee says he has been mysteriously poisoned.
Akhmed Bilalov fled the country after he was fired as the committee’s deputy head, with President Vladimir Putin accusing him of mismanagement.
"They have found elevated levels of mercury in my body," Bilalov, who is now in West Germany, told the Interfax news agency. “[I] began to feel bad in the middle of autumn last year."
He is under a doctor’s care and feeling better, the
Guardian newspaper reports.
"I don't want to blame anyone or speculate on how the mercury appeared in my Moscow office. I have no idea,’’ Bilalov said.
Bilalov had been working on the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, but got axed amid reports of construction delays and cost overruns.
Earlier this month, he was charged with misspending more than $92,000 and he is also being probed in the alleged embezzlement of $2.6 million, the Guardian says.
The budget of the Russian Olympics has ballooned to five times the original estimates. At $51 billion it will now be the world's most expensive Winter Games.
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