Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is welcome to return to Moscow, the Kremlin says, after he was discharged from a German hospital that treated him for poisoning.
Mr Navalny, who western nations believe was poisoned with a Soviet-era nerve agent, was released from hospital after a month, his doctors in Berlin said earlier on Wednesday.
"As regards his returning to Moscow, like any other Russian citizen, he is free to do so at any moment," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said hours later, according to Russian news agencies.
The Kremlin critic spent 32 days in Charite hospital in Berlin after he fell ill on a flight from Siberia to Moscow in what his allies say was a state-sanctioned poisoning attack.
Medics upload Alexei Navalny into a German special medical plane at the airport in Omsk, Russia. Source: AAP
In keeping with the Kremlin's tradition of not using Mr Navalny's name, Mr Peskov said he would welcome news that "the patient really is getting better," and wished him "a speedy recovery".
On Tuesday, Le Monde newspaper reported, citing sources, that Russian President Vladimir Putin had suggested that Mr Navalny might have taken the poison himself "for a non-specified reason".
Reacting to the report, Mr Navalny said in a sarcastic post on Instagram that "that's a good version".
Mr Peskov on Wednesday said the French newspaper had misrepresented a recent conversation between Mr Putin and French leader Emmanuel Macron and that the report was "imprecise".
The Kremlin has dismissed claims that the Russian state was behind Mr Navalny's poisoning as "absurd".
In an Instagram post on Wednesday, the opposition leader detailed his road to recovery, including seeing a physiotherapist every day.
"The plans are always simple: a physiotherapist every day. Possibly a rehabilitation centre. Stand on one leg. Take back control of my fingers completely. Maintain balance," he wrote, accompanied by a picture of him sitting on a bench.
