A top Russian military official was found dead after falling 160 feet from an apartment building.
Marina Yankina, 58, died in St. Petersburg, Russia, Wednesday, according to reports.
Top Putin war official plunges 160 feet to her death from high-rise building https://t.co/DUZE6XQpQV pic.twitter.com/kUR2orPmyP
— New York Post (@nypost) February 17, 2023
The account
“According to a preliminary investigation, it is believed Yankina committed suicide,” the New York Post reported.
“Mash [a Russian Telegram channel] reported that a few minutes before allegedly taking her own life, Yankina called her ex-husband and told him what she was about to do,” it added.
Fired Russian general Vladimir Makarov dies in apparent suicide: report https://t.co/RcsgnGOH6C pic.twitter.com/XeTVsETUF4
— New York Post (@nypost) February 13, 2023
“This mysterious death of Marina Yankina is consistent with the Russian intelligence doctrine of ‘wet affairs’ – or the spilling of blood,” Rebekah Koffler, a former Defense Intelligence Agency intel officer for Russian Doctrine & Strategy, told Fox News.
“In today’s Russia Putin’s critics and those unwilling to go along with his policies are routinely eliminated by assassination,” she said. “Shots in the back of the head, poisonings, forced suicides and other intricate forms of violent death are some examples.”
Second time in a week
The death marked the second time in a week that a Russian leader has died in an alleged suicide, adding to a growing list of mysterious deaths in the nation.
“Russian Ministry of the Interior Maj. Gen. Vladimir Makarov, 72, was found dead in the village of Golikovo, Russian state news agency TASS reported,” it was reported Feb. 13.
“Makarov’s wife, Valentina, found her husband with a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, according to Russian-language news outlet SOTA,” the report added.
Russian official’s ‘suicide’ latest mysterious death that raises questions for Kremlin https://t.co/TCPkeldpn7
— Fox News (@FoxNews) February 17, 2023
Newsweek offers a full list of Russian leaders who have mysteriously died since the start of the Ukraine invasion a year ago. The accounts also include Ravil Maganov, chairman of Russian oil company Lukoil, who was found dead in September after reportedly falling from a hospital window in Moscow.
The concerning reports of falls and suicides among top Russian leaders are among many problems facing President Vladimir Putin. He has also reportedly dealt with his own health problems, faces internal strife among those upset over his strict leadership and faces heavy losses as Western nations support Ukraine against Russia’s invasion of the former Soviet republic.