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Russian President Vladimir Putin presented one of Russia’s most prestigious decorations to a Russian woman killed in a bombing near Moscow on Saturday. It may have been meant for her father who is an ultranationalist sometimes called “Putin’s brain .”
On Monday, Mr. Putin harshly condemned the attack that killed 29-year-old Daria Dugina, a journalist and political scientist who is known as a strong backer of the Kremlin in her own right. A statement by the Kremlin said that the “despicable, cruel crime of car bombing” resulted in the death of Daria Dugina, a journalist and political scientist who was known as a strong supporter for the Kremlin.
“She served people and the Fatherland with honesty,” said Mr. Putin. She proved that it is possible to be a patriotic Russian citizen .”
But the gesture didn’t stop questions from Moscow and Kyiv about who planned the attack and who the target was, or how this will impact a war that is approaching its six-month mark.
Ms. Dugina, like her father Alexander Dugin (hard-line ideologue), was a vocal defender of Russian culture, power and politics and supported the invasion of Ukraine by Mr. Putin in February. News about her death comes as Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi, Kyiv’s top Army general, disclosed Monday during a forum with military veterans that almost 9,000 “Ukrainian heroes” have been killed so far, according to Ukraine’s Interfax news agency.
Russian loss are much higher than estimated, but this was the first update of the cost of war in Ukraine for months by the government of President Volodymyr Zeleskyy.
SEE ALSO: Russia accuses Ukraine of spying agency in the death of a prominent pro-invasion figure
Placing blame
Russian authorities claim that Ms. Dugina was killed when the bomb she had hidden inside her Toyota Land Cruiser exploded on a Moscow highway. According to state-owned TASS news agency, the explosive device was found under the floorboard of the car’s driver’s side.
Less than 24 hours after the attack on the Bombing Tower, Russian intelligence officers pointed out the responsibility to Ukraine, and claimed they had found the perpetrator, Natalya Vovk, a Ukrainian woman who fled to Estonia following the assassination.
” One theory suggests that Dugina could have set off an explosive device with (her) child’s help,” a Russian source of law enforcement to TASS.
The Russian security service, the FSB, said in a statement that Ms. Vovk and her 12-year-old daughter were attending the “Tradition” literary and musical festival where Ms. Dugina was present as an “honored guest.” There are reports that her father, Mr. Dugin, was supposed to have been driving the Toyota that night but changed his mind at the last minute.
The FSB, the successor agency of the Soviet-era KGB, said the 43-year-old Ms. Vovk and her daughter fled to Estonia shortly after the car bombing. Russian officials claimed that Ms. Vovk had been working in the Ukrainian “special forces” and entered Russia with license plates from the Donetsk People’s Republic, a breakaway entity established by the Kremlin.
Mr. Dugin also attributed Kyiv to his daughter’s murder and used this moment to urge Russian soldiers to fight on in Ukraine. “Our hearts long for more than revenge or retribution.” In a statement posted on pro-Kremlin TV network Tsargrad TV, he stated that it was too small. My daughter laid down her maiden and final life at her altar. Please win! It should inspire our Fatherland’s sons to achieve this feat
Officials from Ukraine have dismissed any involvement in the car bombing, and mocked Moscow’s theories.
“I know that hallucinogens from various genesis can cause a loss in connection with reality. But the Russian representatives should realize: The world sees war live, and with it your crimes.” Mykhailo Polyak, an adviser to Mr. Zeleskyy said via Twitter. “Attempts by Ukraine to be blamed for terrorist attacks…or the car bombing in Moscow suburbs are futile
Both Daria and her father, Russian’s ultranationalist group, were prominent figures in Russia’s ultranationalist movement. They promoted the idea of “Novorossiya,” or “New Russia.” This was a strategy to present Russia as an ally of traditional values and as the sovereign natural over all Russian-speaking countries and peoples. The U.S. government and the British Government had placed economic sanctions on each of them for their support for hardline views that attacked the West.
There are many possible causes for this car bombing. The Kremlin could be involved in an internal power struggle or an attack by an unknown terrorist group.
Matthew Schmidt is a University of New Haven foreign policy analyst and Russia expert. He said that Ukraine was the most likely suspect because both Mr. Dugin’s daughter and he were only propagandists.
” The problem with the Ukraine thesis? They risk more than they get. He said that they risk Western support in an interview with The Washington Times. “Neither the Dugins nor their associates have killed anyone .”
or ordered any death.
While Alexander Dugin was not a front-line soldier during the invasion of Ukraine he has been pushing for Russia’s annexe of its smaller neighbour for many decades. According to Financial Times, his book “Foundations for Geopolitics” is mandatory reading for Russian military academies. It argues that Ukraine as a state has no political meaning.
Ilya Pnomarev is a former member Russia’s Parliament called the State Duma. She lives in Kyiv. And she has harshly criticized Mr. Putin. He said that the so-called National Republican Army, which included Russian military personnel and activists, claimed responsibility for the car explosion.
The group that called Putin “a usurper of power” and “a war criminal”, has launched a war against Slavic peoples and sent Russian soldiers into a “certain, senseless death .”
” “We will defeat and destroy Putin,” declared the group in a manifesto released by Ukraine’s Interfax news agency. We declare Russian officials in government and officials of regional administration to be complicit with the usurper. Every one who refuses to resign .”
will be executed.
At this stage, it is impossible to determine who murdered Ms. Dugina. Mr. Schmidt stated that. He also dismissed Ukraine as the culprit, but he said he doubts Moscow’s powerful Oligarchs played any role in Dugina’s death, because they are aligned with Mr. Putin’s vision of “Greater Russia .”
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” “As long as Putin controls security services, everyone knows that he can kill people, and he has done it,” said the professor.
