Another mystery death in Russia as tank boss dies ‘suddenly’ a day after Putin abruptly cancels meeting with him
ANOTHER mysterious death has rocked Russia as a tank boss suddenly died just one day after Vladimir Putin cancelled a meeting with him.
General Alexei Maslov, 69, suddenly fell ill and died on Christmas Day just after Putin axed a visit to the tank firm where he worked in Uralvagonzavod.
Maslov was the former head of the Russian ground forces and an ex-ambassador to Nato - and was reportedly not known to have any health problems before his sudden death.
Putin then suddenly cancelled his visit even as his convoy was in place and the roads had been cleared of snow.
It fuelled speculation amid rumours Vlad is attempting to dodge questions on his failing war in Ukraine or is sick.
No reason was given for the cancellation - and the mystery deepens further after the death of General Maslov.
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Maslov’s death also follows the “sudden death” of Alexander Buzakov, 65, general director of Admiralty Shipyards in St Petersburg, in charge of building new submarines.
The FSB security service had formed an “investigative group” into the two deaths, reported Russian Telegram channel Redacted number 6.
Buzakov had been healthy the day before he died, and “nothing had been heard about Maslov's health problems” before he died, said the channel.
And it follows the mysterious deaths of at least 10 oligarchs and Putin critics.
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Maslov - pictured with Putin - had been commander-in-chief of Russian ground forces between 2004 and 2008, and later served as the country’s chief military representative to NATO in Brussels.
Putin had been due to fly to the Uralvagonzavod plant in Nizhny Tagil - which has been criticised by the Kremlin for failing to produce sufficient new tanks for the war in Ukraine.
However, the Russian president aborted the Christmas Eve trip “at the last minute” with no explanation,
At Nato he worked alongside Dmitry Rogozin, an official close to Putin who was abruptly removed in the summer as head of the Russian Space Agency, Roscosmos.
Rogozin - recovering in hospital from injury in a Ukrainian shell attack last week - praised Maslov as “a very experienced military man, a demanding commander, and a good person”.
Buzakov’s death was described as “sudden, untimely and tragic”.
A regional politician and sausage tycoon known as Russia’s top-earning elected representative Pavel Antov, 65, fell to his death from a window in an Indian hotel in another case that has aroused suspicion.
He had labelled Russian missile strikes on Kyiv as “terror” - before suddenly withdrawing his comment.
A series of recent giant explosions and fires at strategic locations have also raised suspicion of “sabotage” against Putin’s regime.
Anti-war channel Gorod Glypov, with more than 240,000 subscribers, described the deaths as “incomprehensible”.
It claimed a brutal process of “cleansing” to wipe out unwanted people was underway.
Russia was “in a season of accidental window falls, unexpected deaths and ‘regular’ fires”, it stated sarcastically.
The press service at Uralvagonzavod - Russia's largest tank plant - said Maslov has risen from “platoon commander to commander-in-chief of ground forces”.
He “remained faithful to the cause and the Fatherland until the last day”.
He had studied in Ukrainian city Kharkiv, and was later stationed in the Carpathian Mountains.
It comes as Putin's war in Ukraine rolls on - with Vlad now losing more than 100,000 soldiers.
Putin had foolishly expected to steamroller Ukraine and for his soldiers to be welcomed as "liberators" - but they have faced a fierce fightback.
Cities and regions seized at the start of the war at the end of February are now being retaken by the Ukrainians.
The West is heavily supporting Kyiv - loading them up with the weapons they need to defeat Russia.
The recent advances by Ukraine now opens the gateway to Crimea, the territory illegally seized by Russia in 2014.
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And the return of the peninsula to Ukrainian hands would be an unprecedented failure for Putin.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky received a hero's welcome on a visit to Washington DC - sitting down with Joe Biden to agree a deal for some £1.5billion of weapons.
