Secret tape recording
Magazine: Oligarch speaks about Putin’s serious illness
05/14/2022, 10:25 am
How healthy is Putin? There has been speculation for weeks that the Russian President may be seriously ill, just as much as there is about the intentions in the Ukraine war. A US magazine could now have received confirmation of this from the Kremlin boss’s closest circle.
Rumors of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s serious illnesses have been around for a long time, but now they are getting new fuel. The US Magazine “New Lines” reports on a possible cancer of the head of the Kremlin.
The magazine was leaked the audio recording of an oligarch close to the Kremlin who describes Putin as “severely ill with blood cancer,” according to the report. “Of course, we are unable to independently confirm this claim,” the paper writes. “But the recording is the rare testimony from a person with proven ties to the Russian government that the fanatical dictator may be in serious trouble.”
The identity of the oligarch was confirmed based on the voice, but the newspaper does not disclose it. The report simply states that the person is outside of Russia and is on the Forbes list of the 200 richest Russians. The man belonged to a small circle of 20 to 30 people with whom Putin met in 2014 before conquering Crimea. Apparently, the oligarch knew nothing about the recording, which a Western venture capitalist is said to have taken and made available to the magazine out of disgust at the war.
The paper considers the oligarch’s assessment to be plausible and quotes Christo Grozev, head of investigations at the investigative platform Bellingcat, among others. Accordingly, the oligarch’s claim is now being carried further among Moscow’s elites. In a memo from the domestic secret service FSB, the regional heads were instructed “not to trust rumors about the president’s incurable condition,” Grozev said.
Doctors and a swollen face
Proyekt, a respected Russian investigative news agency, recently reported that Putin routinely travels within Russia accompanied by medical specialists. Among them are Alexey Shcheglyov and Igor Yesakov, both ENT doctors, Konstantin Sim, an orthopedic traumatologist, and Yevgeny Selivanov, a neurosurgeon specializing in oncology. According to the investigative project, Putin had also shown a striking interest in thyroid cancer. Among other things, he met with the head of the National Medical Research Center for Endocrinology, Ivan Dedov, in July 2020.
Ashley Grossman, Professor of Endocrinology at the University of Oxford, pointed out in an interview with “New Lines” that a possible cancer could also explain Putin’s changed appearance. In the past few months, several pictures have appeared in which the Kremlin boss had a swollen face. “Putin was always a very fit-looking man with a slightly gaunt appearance,” said Grossmann. “But in recent years he seems to have gotten fuller in the face and neck.” This appearance is associated with the use of steroids, which in turn are used to treat different types of lymphoma or myeloma.
In the conversation, the oligarch is said to have said about Putin: “He absolutely ruined the Russian economy, the Ukrainian economy and many other economies – absolutely ruined them,” said the oligarch. “The problem is in his head. … One madman can turn the world upside down.”