Moscow In its war against Ukraine, Russia has blamed the leadership in Kiev for the assassination of Kremlin-affiliated military blogger Vladlen Tatarsky in St. Petersburg. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov spoke of a “terrorist attack” on Monday. The 40-year-old Tatarski, whose real name was Maxim Fomin and was described by the Ukrainian media as a “belligerent sadist”, died in an explosion in a café in the center of St. Petersburg on Sunday. The assassination triggered widespread horror in the Russian power apparatus.
Moscow’s state media also showed surveillance camera videos of the explosion in the café. More than 30 people were injured when the explosive device blew up. Videos showed destroyed tables and chairs in the café and traces of blood. When the detonation took place in broad daylight in the hometown of Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin, parts of the facade also fell onto the sidewalk and onto the street.
Investigators arrested a 26-year-old woman who presented Tatarski with a plaster bust at an event at the cafe. Tatarski, who himself had called for the “total annihilation of Ukraine”, wanted to talk about his experiences as a war reporter in the combat zone in eastern Ukraine. In a video of the interrogation released by the Russian Interior Ministry, the woman admitted to having presented the figure to Tatarski.
However, the accused did not admit to murder plans, nor did she say from whom she received the bust. According to Russian media, her husband said that she was incapable of killing anyone. Nor did she leave the café after the gift was handed over. Rather, his wife assumed that a bug was attached to the bust in order to listen to Tatarski. The investigations continued according to the authorities.
Kremlin spokesman Peskov accused the “regime” in Kiev of having been organizing “terrorist attacks” for a long time. That’s also why Russia started its war against the country, he said. The Russian Anti-Terrorism Committee claimed that the Ukrainian secret services used the suspect, who has since been detained, for the “terrorist attack”. Accordingly, the woman is said to have been connected to the anti-corruption foundation of the imprisoned Kremlin opponent Alexei Navalny.
War blogger dies in explosion in St. Petersburg
The media had previously reported that the alleged perpetrator had taken part in demonstrations calling for Navalny’s release in the past and, like the leader of the opposition, was a staunch opponent of the war.
Navalny employees blame FSB
Navalny’s team, working in exile, categorically denied the accusations made by the Russian authorities. Rather, agents of the domestic secret service FSB were responsible for the murder of the propagandist, said opposition members Ivan Zhdanov and Leonid Volkov.
For years, the power apparatus has been trying to attach terror to the opposition, said Zhdanov. Corresponding allegations by the Anti-Terrorism Committee are sensitive in that Navalny will soon have to answer in a new criminal case for extremism. For the Russian investigators, the accusation in the case of the explosion is now convenient in that Navalny can be sentenced to the maximum penalty for terrorism, said Zhdanov. He and Volkov accused the FSB of staging political assassinations for years.
The FSB itself “eliminated” this blogger, who also criticized the warfare of the Defense Ministry in Moscow, Zhdanov said. In fact, Tatarski had attested to the military apparatus’ system errors’ and made suggestions for improving warfare. To the annoyance of the powerful security apparatus, the influential military bloggers repeatedly criticize corruption and abuse of office in the state leadership.
The head of Wagner’s private army, Yevgeny Prigozhin, who owned the café where Tatarsky died, had repeatedly denounced these abuses. Prigozhin praised the blogger as a true patriot and showed up with a Russia flag with Tatarsky’s name on it. The Wagner boss also contradicted the Kremlin version and sees more of a group of radical opponents of the war behind the attack. “I would not blame the regime in Kiev for these actions,” he said.
This is how the Handelsblatt reports on the Ukraine war:
In Kiev, the adviser to the presidential office, Mykhailo Podoliak, like Navalny’s team, saw the attack more as a sign of power struggles in Russia. Even “spiders” would eat each other in a jar, he said.
Navalny’s Zhdanov said the agents “poison and kill each other, divide their territories. These cases just aren’t all public.” Now the secret service agents wanted to attach something to Navalny’s anti-corruption foundation. “They need not only the external absolute enemy in the form of Ukraine, but also an internal enemy in the form of the Navalny team,” Zhdanov said.
His colleague Volkov said that the “all-powerful secret service agents” would otherwise have the situation under control, but now they had allowed something like this to happen in the center of St. Petersburg of all places – that speaks for the FSB as responsible. It is the second case in which a Russian propagandist has been killed since the Russian war of aggression began more than a year ago. Publicist Darja Dugina died in a car explosion near Moscow last year.
More: Current news on developments in the Ukraine war can be found in our news blog