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FACES OF EVIL
I’m Stalin’s great-grandson – Putin is ‘likely DEAD’ & mystery Kremlin insiders have been using body doubles for years
Stalin's great-grandson Jacob Jugashvili believes it's 'very likely' the real Putin is already dead
VLADIMIR Putin has "long disappeared" and body doubles have been used for decades, Joseph Stalin's great-grandson has claimed.
Jacob Jugashvili - who is closely involved in Russian politics - believes the tyrant is "very likely" dead and has been replaced by actors "being manipulated by unelected persons who seized power" inside the Kremlin.
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Putin, 71, has long been accused of using body doubles, including by Ukraine's military intelligence.
Spokesman Andriy Yusov claimed the dictator has at least three, who are kept under strict guard and "constant surveillance" by the Russian Secret Service.
Some Russian sources believe Putin is dead and has been replaced by body doubles manipulated by shadowy Kremlin figures.
Others claim doubles are used because Putin is seriously ill or hiding in a bunker, paranoid about his security.
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Earlier in the year, Putin himself added fuel to the fire by saying his old school pals "barely recognise him".
Putin reportedly said to a small group of people in Chukotka: “When I meet my classmates or fellow university students, they often look at me and say - ‘I don’t believe it, is it actually you, or not you?’”
Allegations that the dictator’s New Year Address which was broadcast across Russia was made by an AI Putin again sparked wild rumours.
Jugashvili, who also works as an artist, claims Putin hasn't been on the seen for many years.
Most read in The Sun
Speaking exclusively to The Sun, the 51-year-old said: "Putin has long disappeared, and instead of him, unknown and unelected persons who seized power in the Kremlin manipulate actors who do not look like Putin.
"The images of real Putin do not match those that appeared since 2002.
"Also the current Putin does not behave like a high-ranking authority figure.
"It is very likely that the real Putin is dead.
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"To those who might accuse me of conspiracy: conspiracy is what the secret services of all countries are paid for. It's their job."
Jugashvili is the son of Yevgeni Jugashvili and grandson of Yakov Iosifovich Dzhugashvili - the eldest son of Soviet dictator Stalin.
Stalin's regime has been widely condemned for mass repression, ethnic cleansing, censorship, hundreds of thousands of executions, and famines that killed millions.
He was estimated to have been responsible for the deaths of some nine million people before his demise in 1953.
Jugashvili refused to say who was responsible for the crimes committed during the regime of his great-grandfather Stalin.
But he did blast the Ukraine war as "illegal" - and believes there is no end in sight as Putin is determined to declare victory.
The Russian tyrant has previously been dubbed "Little Stalin" after sending his soldiers to die en masse in Ukraine as well as using Soviet-style tactics against his enemies.
Experts have also drawn a likeness between both dictators, with their ruthless crackdowns and their attempts to turn the country into a superpower to face down the West.
Vlad praised Stalin's leadership, crediting him for transforming Russia while openly bemoaning the fall of the Soviet Union.
It is very likely that the real Putin is dead
Jacob Jugashvili
Jugashvili said the Ukraine war does not have the support of the Russian people - who he believes deserve to have a leader they can freely judge.
Ageing dictator Putin is set to cement his grip on power in Russia until at least 2030 as millions take to the polls this weekend.
But with any opposition figure who could have challenged him either in prison, in exile or dead, there is little hope the election will be free or fair.
It means the tyrant - the longest-serving Kremlin leader since Stalin - is destined for a fifth term at the country's helm.
Jugashvili said: "Democracy is just a way of forming the state authorities by means of elections. Is there any guarantee that they will serve the public after they are elected? Absolutely not.
"The only way to prevent the ruling elite from degradation is to give the citizens of the Russian Federation a legitimate opportunity to judge the elected authorities depending on the results of their achievements.
"During the new elections, the people will pass a verdict on the previously elected authorities and in accordance with that verdict punish them or award them.
Who was Joseph Stalin?
JOSEPH Stalin was the dictator of the Soviet Union from 1929 to 1953.
He held a reign of terror over the country - with millions of his own citizens dying during his regime.
The Soviet monster rose up the political ranks after being appointed to serve on the first Central Committee of the Bolshevik Parky by Lenin in 1912.
After Lenin died in 1924, Stalin saw off his rivals and by the end of the 1920s became the dictators of the Soviet Union.
During his reign, he ruthlessly dealt with opponents by eliminating them.
Under his rule, he strengthened the powers of the secret police and even encouraged citizens to spy on each other.
Millions of his people were killed or sent to the Gulag.
In the 1930s, he instituted the Great Purge in a bid to destroy anyone who threatened the Communist Party and Soviet society.
On the eve of World War Two, he signed a pact with Adolf Hitler before annexing parts of Poland and Romania, plus parts of the Baltics.
But two years into the war Germany invaded the USSR - triggering Stalin to direct a scorched earth defensive policy.
By early 1943, the Red Army defeated the Germans.
In the later years of his reign, he orchestrated purges and executions.
Stalin also oversaw the exploding of an atomic bomb - taking the Soviets into the nuclear age.
At the age of 74, Stalin suffered a stroke and died on March 5, 1953.
It is estimated Stalin was responsible for the deaths of between six and 20 million people during his rule.
"If no verdict gets a majority of votes, the government is replaced without consequences, as it is now.
"The country needs a leader who will give the people of Russia the right to judge him at the end of his term."
Born in 1972 in Tbilisi, Georgia, Jugashvili completed his secondary education in Moscow before studying at the Tbilisi State Academy of Fine Arts from 1992-1994.
In 1997 he graduated from the Glasgow School of Art with a BA.
Between 1997 and 2000 Jacob showed at various London venues: including the Boundary Gallery, Lamont Gallery, and Royal College of Art.
In October 2005 he joined his father, a military historian and retired colonel of the Soviet Army, Yevgeni Jugashvili - who died in 2016 - to a conference in the Netherlands named ‘Yalta and Beyond’.
It was organised by the Maastricht University and Assamblee BV to mark the 60th anniversary of the Yalta Summit in 1945.
The event was also attended by the grandsons of the two other Allied leaders Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt.
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Jacob Jugashvili is currently involved with politics and public movements in Russian Federation.
He is an IGPR ZOV movement activist. In 2015 four IGPR ZOV members were arrested “for attempting to initiate a referendum” and jailed for four years by Russian authorities.
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