The Yevgeny Prigozhin’s death in an alleged plane crash, which occurred just two months after his challenge to the Kremlin, has sparked speculation. Ukraine has not hesitated to point directly to Moscow: “Putin forgives no one”has asserted the adviser to the Presidency Mikhailo Podoliak, who believes that the Wagner leader signed his “death warrant” by trusting the word of the Russian president after the mutiny.

In his opinion, the elimination of Prigozhin “is a signal from Putin to the Russian elites”, to whom he sends a clear message: “Disloyalty equals death”. Less blunt, but not surprised either, has been the president of the United States, Joe Bidenupon hearing the news: “Not much happens in Russia without Putin behind it.“said the Democratic president.

In the absence of any type of confirmation in this regard, the truth is that Prigozhin He would not be the first Putin critic to end up dead, or on the verge of death. One of the most famous cases is that of the Russian ex-spy Alexander Litvinenko, poisoned with polonium-210 in a cup of tea in a London hotel in 2006.

From Litvinenko to Navalny

At the time of his death, Litvinenko was 43 years old and had to be buried in a special coffin to avoid a radioactive leak, as reported by the media then Communication. He was a former KGB agent who was outspokenly critical of Putin and had left Russia six years before his assassination. A British investigation would conclude in 2016 that the crime was perpetrated by two Russian citizens, including a former KGB bodyguard, and that Putin himself probably approved of it.

The Russian tycoon Alexander Perepilichny He was found dead near his London home in 2012. He had fled to the UK after helping a Swiss investigation into a Russian money-laundering scheme. His sudden death raised suspicions of poisoning, but British police ruled out murder. In a hearing prior to the investigation, however, it was noted that traces of a rare and deadly poison would have been found in his stomach.

the journalist Anna Politkovskayawho wrote about human rights abuses, was shot to death in front of her home in Moscow in 2006, when I was coming back from the supermarket. The murder of Politkovskaya, then 48 years old with two children, sparked outrage in the West.

Others, like Alexei Navalni, narrowly escaped death: The Russian opposition leader, still in jail, had to be treated in Germany in 2020 after being poisoned in Siberia with Novichok, a nerve agent developed by the Soviet military. The same substance was used against a former double agent, Sergey Skripalwho was poisoned in the United Kingdom along with his daughter Yulia in 2018. Although they were in critical condition, both survived.

Also the opponent Vladimir Kara-Murza assures that they tried to poison him in 2015 and 2017. A German laboratory found high levels of mercury, copper, manganese and zinc in his body, according to the Reuters agency. the former ukrainian president Viktor Yushchenko was poisoned during the 2004 presidential election. He claimed to have been poisoned while having dinner outside Kyiv with agents of the Ukrainian security services. His face was disfigured as a result of the attack.