A purported ex-Kremlin source claims that the Russian oil tycoon who died yesterday after falling to his death from the sixth floor of a hospital in Moscow was killed "with Vladimir Putin's knowledge."
The head of the Russian oil major Lukoil, 67-year-old Ravil Maganov, mysteriously fell from the Central Clinical Hospital in Moscow at approximately 7:30 am local time yesterday and died immediately.
Russian Lukoil Chief Mysteriously Dies
While law enforcement officials said there was no suicide note and no CCTV cameras on the part of the building where Maganov fell, Russian state media swiftly reported that his death was a suicide. According to the Russian Telegram channel General SVR, Maganov was "beaten" before being "thrown out of a window." General SVR frequently shares purported insider information on Putin and the Kremlin.
Per Daily Mail, one of the only significant Russian businesses to demand a stop to hostilities in Ukraine following Moscow's invasion was his own, Lukoil. The anti-Putin station claimed inside information from the Kremlin, which is allegedly trying to shut it down, but provided no proof or additional information to support its assertion.
Previous reports about Putin's purported sicknesses and other oil tycoons who inexplicably passed away in recent months have been circulated on the Telegram group. General SVR is one of the few well-known anti-Putin channels in Russia, according to those who doubt it, but others who believe it offers a window into the real events taking place at the Kremlin.
One story from May claimed that the FSB, its director Alexander Bortnikov, and Security Council secretary Nikolai Patrushev, with Putin's agreement, were responsible for the unexplained deaths of several Russian businesspeople connected to Gazprom.
The report said that an investigation had been conducted. Deaths then occurred. It was said that "Putin authorized the full list for liquidation without seeing."
Dmitry Peskov, a spokesperson for President Vladimir Putin, told reporters on Thursday that Maganov's passing was not a concern for the Kremlin. In 1954, Maganov was born. He has been employed at Lukoil since 1993 and served as its president, as per NDTV.
He was one of the founding members of Lukoil and, according to the firm, is responsible for the name's current form. 2020 saw Maganov's appointment as chairman. Maganov "immensely contributed" to the firm and the Russian oil and gas industry, according to a statement released by Lukoil on Thursday. It stated that Lukoil became one of the top energy corporations in the world because to Maganov's "managerial skills."
Other Russian Oligarchs' Suspicious Deaths in 2022
Since late January, at least eight notable Russian businesspeople have either committed suicide or perished in incidents that are still not fully understood, with six of them being connected to Russia's two main energy corporations.
The other two were connected to Lukoil, Russia's largest privately held oil and gas business. Four of those six were connected to the Russian state-owned energy behemoth Gazprom or one of its subsidiaries. Earlier this year, the business adopted an uncommon public position by denouncing Russia's war in Ukraine, pleading for compassion for the victims, and advocating for an end to the hostilities.
A senior Gazprom official was discovered dead in his cabin in the town of Leninsky near Leningrad on January 30, 2022, according to Russian state media agency RIA Novosti, in the first fatality reported this year. According to RIA, a suicide note was discovered at the scene, and the death was being looked into as a suicide. The individual has been identified as Leonid Shulman, the transport director at Gazprom Invest, by the Russian national television network RenTv.
A month later, another senior Gazprom official was discovered deceased in the same hamlet. The independent Russian website Novaya Gazeta states that Alexander Tyulakov was found dead on February 25 in his garage. According to Novaya Gazeta, he committed suicide.
In suspected murder-suicide instances that occurred in April, two more Russian businessmen with connections to Gazprom perished. According to TASS, one of them, Vladislav Avayev, a former vice president of Gazprombank, was discovered dead in his Moscow residence on April 18 together with his wife and kid.
The Avayevs' deaths were being looked into as a murder-suicide. The family driver and the nanny informed a relative that they could not be reached by phone or entered the apartment because the door was locked from the inside, according to Yulia Ivanova of the Investigative Committee for Moscow.
A former vice president of Gazprombank who just moved from Russia to Ukraine, Igor Volobuev, told CNN that he did not think Avayev committed suicide. A former executive at the gas giant Novatek, which is partially controlled by Gazprom, Sergey Protosenya, was discovered dead at his house in the Mediterranean resort of Lloret de Mar, close to Barcelona, just one day later, on April 19.
An official source familiar with the inquiry told CNN last week that the deaths of his wife and daughter, both of whom had visible indications of abuse, were discovered inside the family's opulent house while Protosenya's body was discovered outdoors in the yard.
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