#Alexei Navalny shares first photo from German hospital after poisoning

Russian dissident Alexei Navalny on Tuesday posted a photograph of himself in a German hospital bed surrounded by family members – looking gaunt as he recovers from being poisoned.

“Hi, this is Navalny. I miss you,” Navalny wrote in Russian on Instagram, adding that he still can’t do anything – but managed to breathe by himself all day Monday.

“I did not use any outside help, not even the simplest valve in my throat. I liked it very much,” he told his followers from Berlin’s Charite hospital while surrounded by his wife and other relatives.

On Monday, the Kremlin critic — who fell deathly ill after drinking alleged poisoned tea at a Siberian airport on his way to Moscow last month — vowed to return to Russia as soon as he is recovered.

“He’s not planning to go into exile in Germany,” a top German security officer told The New York Times. “He wants to go home to Russia, and he wants to continue his mission.

“He’s fully aware of his condition, he’s fully aware of what happened and he’s fully aware of where he is,” the officer added of the 44-year-old activist.

Navalny had been flown to Germany to be treated two days after being poisoned.

His family insists the poisoning was the work of the Kremlin, but Russian authorities deny the charge.

News of Navalny’s refusal to keep away from Russia came hours after specialized labs in France and Sweden independently confirmed he was poisoned by Novichok, a nerve agent that is a purported favorite of Moscow intelligence forces.