In the late 1990s, Russian oligarchs were the darlings of fate. With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the entry of the market economy into Russia, Russian businessmen have amassed enormous wealth in the field of natural resources and raw materials. Some of them even found themselves at the head of strategic companies, BTA writes.
But since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the golden age of Russian oligarchs seems to be coming to an end, and they have been showered with economic sanctions imposed by the EU, the United States, Canada, Britain, Australia and other countries.
Blocked assets, yachts, access to luxury villas and chalets in Europe … To this flood of punitive measures is now added a mysterious series of suicides of oligarchs, according to Western media. French television BeFM recalls that at least four oligarchs have been found dead since February 28.
Everything suggests that these are suicides. But the most embarrassing thing is that three of the oligarchs killed their wives and children before taking their own lives.
First on this sinister list was Michael Watford. Born 66 years ago in the former Soviet Socialist Republic of Ukraine, he amassed a fortune in oil and natural gas. On February 28, he was found dead at his Surrey residence in the United Kingdom. His gardener found him hanged in his garage. According to a police source, there are no suspicious circumstances surrounding his death, reminds the BBC.
On March 24, Vasily Melnikov was found dead along with his wife Galina and their two children in their apartment in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia. According to police sources quoted by Kommersant, Melnikov stabbed his wife and children before committing suicide.
On April 18, Vladislav Avaev, a former senior official at Gazprombank, the banking subsidiary of Russian gas giant Gazprom, was found dead with his wife and daughter. Their bodies were found in a luxury Moscow apartment. There was a pistol in the oligarch’s hands.
He is believed to have killed his wife and child before committing suicide. Prior to Gazprombak, Avaev worked for the Russian president’s office and the State Duma.
The next day, April 19, Sergei Protosenya, head of the Russian energy giant Novatek, was found dead along with the bodies of his wife and daughter in a villa for rent in Lloret del Mar, Spain. The oligarch was found hanged in the garden of his villa, and his wife and daughter were found murdered with firearms. According to the local media “Telesinko”, the police are working on two versions – murder and suicide or triple murder, disguised as a domestic tragedy.
Are these deaths interconnected and is there Kremlin interference? So far, nothing says so. Moreover, none of these oligarchs has openly spoken out against the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
But this series of suicides among Russian oligarchs may be talking about something – namely, that the end of a shameful system, criticized especially by opposition leader Alexei Navalny, is coming to an end, former Russian diplomat Vladimir Federovsky told BFM.
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