In November 1927, after receiving news that Adolph Joffe had committed suicide, he assigned Ukrainian campaigning to Voja Vujović, and returned to Moscow. Following the defeat of the Left Opposition in November–December 1927, Rakovsky was ousted from the Comintern, the Central Committee, and eventually from the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He was exiled, first to Astrakhan, Saratov, and then to Barnaul. Shortly before the decision, he commented to his visitor, French writer Pierre Naville: "The French expelled me from Paris for having signed a declaration of the opposition. Stalin expelled me from the Affairs Commissariat for having signed the same declaration. But in both cases they let me keep the jacket".