Raid on Ksenia Sobchak
Daughter of Putin’s foster father flees to Lithuania
10/27/2022 02:21 am
Xenia Sobchak repeatedly criticized the Russian attack on Ukraine on her YouTube channel – and yet remained unmolested for months. Suddenly the police are investigating the former Russian presidential candidate. The 40-year-old thinks she knows why.
Russian journalist Ksenia Sobchak has left Russia. The daughter of Anatoly Aleksandrovich Sobchak, President Vladimir Putin’s political mentor, has fled to Lithuania after allegations of blackmail, according to unconfirmed reports. The former presidential candidate entered the country with an Israeli passport, according to sources in the Lithuanian border guard. Lithuania had blocked entry for Russians with tourist visas.
The Russian news agency Tass and the state broadcaster RT had previously reported, citing the police, that Sobchak was suspected of being involved in a case of large-scale extortion. Such an offense can be punished in Russia with up to 15 years imprisonment.
According to Tass, Sobchak’s residence was already searched on Wednesday morning. In addition, the commercial manager of your media company Attention Media was arrested after he is said to have accepted a payment of 800,000 rubles (approx. 13,000 euros). Attention Media operates, among other things, Sobchak’s YouTube channel with more than three million subscribers. There, the journalist had repeatedly criticized the Russian attack on Ukraine in recent months.
“Attack on my editorial office”
On Telegram, Sobchak denied the allegations against her. It is an attempt to put pressure on your media company. “It is clear that this is an attack on my editorial office, the last free editorial office in Russia that had to be put under pressure,” wrote the 40-year-old. She hopes there is a misunderstanding.
Sobchak ran in the 2018 election for the Russian presidency against incumbent Putin. At the time, observers accused her of allowing herself to be exploited to give the election a semblance of competition. Sobchak is reportedly Putin’s goddaughter. Her father Anatoly, the late mayor of St. Petersburg, was once the chief and professor of the Russian president.