Filenews 9 March 2024 - by Zachary Folk
A former Russian helicopter pilot who defected last year due to the war in Ukraine was found shot dead in a village in Spain on February 13, another critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin who has died under suspicious circumstances since Russia's invasion of Ukraine began in 2022.
February 16 – Alexei Navalny: Putin's longtime critic and opposition leader, who was serving a 19-year prison sentence, was found dead at age 47 after collapsing in his prison yard, weeks after being abruptly transferred to a remote facility in the Russian Arctic.
February 13 – Maxim Kuzmenov: 0 28-year-old helicopter pilot who defected due to the war in Ukraine was found shot dead in the Spanish village of Villajoyosa, but was identified days later as he lived under a false name.
November 2 – Lieutenant General Vladimir Sviridov: The 68-year-old commander of the Russian air force, who has previously been critical of Putin, was found dead in his home with his wife, according to Radio Free Europe.
October 1 – Vladimir Nekrasov: The 66-year-old chairman of Lukoil (which took a rare public stand on the war in Ukraine, calling for a quick end to the war) who took over after the mysterious death of President Ravil Maganov, died of heart failure, the company confirmed, providing few further details.
August 23 – Yevgeny Prigozhin: A plane carrying leaders of Russia's famed Wagner mercenary group is shot down, killing the group's leader Prigozhn, 62, having previously led a failed mutiny attempt earlier in 2023.
August 16 – Gennady Lopirev: The 69-year-old former major general of Russia's Federal Guard Service, who once oversaw Putin's Sochi compound, was found dead of an unspecified illness in a penal colony where he was serving a 10-year prison sentence for bribery, Radio Free Europe reported, citing the Russian prison service.
December 24, 2022 – Pavel Andov: Regional official, former chief executive of a meat industry and reportedly a critic of Putin's war in Ukraine, Andov, 65, died after falling from the window of the Sai International hotel in India, just two days after his business partner Vlavdimir Bidenov, 61, died of heart failure at the same hotel.
September 1, 2022 – Ravil Maganov: 67-year-old chairman of Russian oil giant Lukoil died after falling from the window of a hospital in Moscow, months after his company emerged as one of the few Russian firms to criticize the war in Ukraine.
August 14, 22 – Dan Rapoport: Latvian-American investor and nightclub owner Rapoport, 52, a Putin critic and Navalny supporter, was found dead after falling from his luxury apartment building in Washington, D.C., and while police found no initial evidence of criminal activity, Rapoport's friends and colleagues told POLITICO that his sudden death was highly suspicious.
Since Putin was first elected president of Russia in 2000, many of his critics and political opponents have met violent deaths both at home and abroad. Sergei Yushenkov, former leader of the Liberal Party and one of Putin's first political opponents, was shot to death in 2003 outside his Moscow home. His executioner was never arrested. A similar fate befell Boris Nemtsov, who was shot in the back near the Kremlin in 2015. Although five men were arrested and convicted of killing the former opposition leader, his family members rejected the convictions and told the Guardian they were directly linked to Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, a close ally of Putin. Significant numbers of Putin's critics and defectors have also been poisoned abroad. In 2006, former Federal Security Service agent Alexander Litvinenko in London was killed after drinking tea with polonium. Litvinenko defected to the UK in 2000 and became a critic of the Russian president. Many critics have since been poisoned by novichok, a chemical weapon developed by the Soviet Union, including fellow defector Sergei Skripal and his wife Yulia in 2018. Navalny was also poisoned by the nerve agent in 2020, but survived the assassination attempt.
In addition to targeting politicians and businessmen, Russia has also severely restricted journalists regarding the war in Ukraine. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a total of 37 journalists have been killed covering the war in Ukraine, with most deaths being "crossfired", "mission dangerous" or "murder". At least 12 others have been arrested in the country, including two American journalists jailed for covering the war in Ukraine, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gerskovich and Radio Free Europe editor Alsou Kurmasheva. Russia has since banned the US-funded Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty as an "undesirable" influence.
