Russian reformist Yegor Gaidar has been released from hospital after treatment for an illness he suffered in Ireland that was caused by an unknown toxic substance, according to doctors.
Gaidar's spokesman
Mr Gaidar began vomiting and fainted during a conference in Maynooth on November 24th, and he was rushed into intensive care at the James Connolly Memorial Hospital before being flown back to a hospital in Moscow.
"The doctors say the illness was likely caused by a toxic factor. But they cannot determine the nature of the substance, so they are refraining from using the term 'poisoning'," Mr Gaidar's spokesman said after receiving the doctors' final report.
"The doctors can't say that it is an ordinary illness."
The spokesman quoted the doctors as saying traces of a toxic substance could be detected no later than 48 hours after the illness.
Mr Gaidar, acting prime minister under former president Boris Yeltsin and architect of market reforms, was taken to the Moscow hospital 60 hours after he first felt unwell. He will continue treatment at home.
Mr Gaidar (50), now an influential academic, was taken to hospital shortly after the death of former KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko in Britain from radiation poisoning.
Mr Litvinenko's poisoning is suspected by some to have been sanctioned by Russian President Vladimir Putin. The Kremlin has denied any link to the death and today agreed to co-operate with the Scotland Yard investigation in to the former spy's death.
Critics have also tied Mr Litvinenko's death and Mr Gaidar's poisoning to the murder of Russian investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya, also a Kremlin critic.