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Vladimir Putin’s top security official has vanished during efforts to end the war in Ukraine, amid swirling health rumours and claims he could be caught up in a corruption probe. Sergei Shoigu, 69, is a Russian army general and currently the secretary of the powerful Russian Security Council. He served as defence minister for most of the war in Ukraine before being replaced one year ago, and is a very well-known member of Putin's entourage. Speculation is swirling in Moscow after he missed the Red Square parade on Friday amid claims his absence was health-related. But an explanation that he...

DICTATOR Vladimir Putin has showed off his private chapel and his favourite drink in a bizarre tour of his Kremlin apartment. The Russian tyrant gave the public a glimpse into his home in an interview marking the 25th anniversary of his first inauguration as president. The bizarre footage shows Putin giving his favourite interviewer, Pavel Zarubin, a tour of the apartment while answering his questions. When asked about his grandchildren from daughters Maria, 39, and Katerina, 37, Putin says they occasionally visit him unexpectedly in his austere apartment. He said: “They can, they can. “But still everyone understands that I...

PUTIN henchman and Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov is "preparing to flee Russia" - as he has put his son in charge of the police. The infamous leader of Chechnya has already made several moves to prepare for his escape - and his efforts have sparked a conflict with Kremlin cronies. The 48-year-old dictator is a vocal supporter of Russian tyrant Vladimir Putin, and has sent tens of thousands of troops to support the bloody war in Ukraine. He has also been accused of violating human rights, including involvement in kidnapping and torture. But relations between Putin and Kadyrov have soured...

NATO fighter planes were scrambled today amid a brutal Russian missile and military drone onslaught on civilian, energy and military sites in Ukraine. Harrowing footage showed residents in Poltava screaming after a strike destroyed ordinary apartment blocks triggering fires amid the debris of smashed buildings. The wave of attacks by Vladimir Putin - which led to power cuts in multiple regions - came soon after Donald Trump announced in the Oval Office that his administration was actively talking to Moscow. “We are having very serious discussions about that war, trying to get it ended,” said the US president. On whether...

Watch the historic moment the sea drone takes down an aerial target. DRAMATIC footage shows the moment Ukraine claimed the historic downing of a Russian M-8 military helicopter off the coast of occupied Crimea by a missile-firing sea drone. Kyiv's military intelligence announced the strike in the Black Sea with a Magura V5 and included a clip of the historic moment. In the black-and-white footage taken from the sea drone, bursts of water can be seen around the drone launching into the air as Vladimir Putin's chopper attacked. Viewers can quickly spot the Russian aircraft in the top right-hand corner...

AT least one person has died after a Russian oil tanker split in two, with a second ship damaged in the Black Sea. Footage shows one of the tankers split completely in half, with its bow vertically in the water, upturned and rapidly sinking. An emergency rescue operation is currently underway to desperately evacuate both crews in yet another blow to Putin. The Volgoneft-212 and Volgoneft-239 are wrecked in the Kerch Strait amid fears for at least 27 sailors, with the damage reportedly resulting in a devastating oil spill. Russian investigators say they have opened two criminal cases to look...

A leading Putin missile scientist has reportedly been gunned down in a Moscow park by a Ukrainian military assassin. Mikhail Shatsky, the Deputy Chief Designer at the Mars Design Bureau, which develops and manufactures onboard guidance systems for the Russian military and space industry, was allegedly eliminated by an unknown assassin in Kuzminsky forest park, at Kotelniki, eight miles southeast of the Kremlin. Reports say the scientist, an associate professor, was working actively on upgrading the Russian Kh-59 cruise missile to the Kh-69 level, which Russian troops use to strike Ukraine. There was immediate speculation that he was assassinated by...

Ukrainian long-range missiles have struck a major military centre inside Russia which is home to Vladimir Putin's 'Flying Kremlin' doomsday plane. The strikes hit Taganrog, a city of about a quarter of a million people in the Rostov region, causing ten loud explosions and bright flashes. Initial reports said there were two possible targets - the Beriev Aircraft Company, which maintains some of Putin's most important planes, and the Krasny Hydropress plant, which makes key missile elements and is part of Russia's Tactical Missile Weapons Corporation. Putin's Ilyushin Il-80 Maxdome plane - for use in nuclear war - is maintained...

Vladimir Putin's new 'wonder-weapon' caused little damage when he unleashed it on Ukraine, satellite pictures show, despite Russian claims that a defence plant in Dnipro was 'erased to dust'. Furious Russian pro-war military pundits are questioning if they have been misled by Putin's boastful claims over the 'unstoppable' Oreshnik.

The Kremlin has rushed out a statement denying Vladimir Putin has health problems after the Russian leader admitted undergoing regular examinations at a top Moscow hospital. The Russian despot, 72, was speaking in a televised session with his health minister Mikhail Murashko aimed at encouraging people to have flu jabs when he admitted getting "all sorts of regular examinations". He said: "Doctors at the Central Clinical Hospital, where I undergo all sorts of regular examinations, also recommend getting vaccinated with domestically produced drugs." The admission appears to have sparked speculation that Putin may have some kind of medical condition -...

Vladimir Putin is ready to share sovereignty of Crimea with Ukraine, according to an astonishing 'new peace plan'. The dictator sent his trusted interior minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev to the US with new proposals to end the war that the dictator started, say sources in both Moscow and Kyiv. Despite being sanctioned, Kolokoltsev was allowed into the US ostensibly to attend a UN meeting of police chiefs. But this was a ruse allowing him to travel to Washington on a VIP plane from Putin's presidential fleet to transmit to the US government the dictator's real demands for a peace deal, it...

Dramatic footage shows the moment a suspected Ukrainian plane-type UAV explodes as it was targeted at a Russian plant assembling Iranian Shahed drones used in the war. There was a huge blast and fireball near Yelabuga, deep in Russia, at least 660 miles from the closest Ukrainian territory. A total of three strikes were reported in the area. Russian sources say it hit a dormitory for workers in the Alabuga economic zone in the Republic of Tatarstan, where it is believed the deadly Iranian drones are assembled. It is unclear so far if there was also damage to the drone-making...

Voting for Russia's presidential elections was disrupted today in the border region Belgorod amid new shelling and incursions of anti-Kremlin Russian groups from Ukraine that forced 'thousands' of people to evacuate. Polling was suspended in Belgorod city after it came under artillery fire, with clips circulated by Russian news channels on the Telegram messaging app showing trucks and cars blown to pieces by the shelling. Election officials were seen wearing bulletproof gear as they monitored voting on the first day of a three-day election expected to return Putin by a landslide. Meanwhile, footage appears to show anti-Putin pro-Ukrainian partisan paramilitary...

Four oil tanks hit by Ukrainian 'drone strike' at naval port in annexed Crimea Video shows huge fireball raging and Russia says fire will not be out until tonight A huge ball of fire is raging in Crimea after a suspected Ukrainian aerial drone strike hit a major fuel depot in the heart of an annexed naval port Sevastopol today. Footage showed a fireball with huge flames and a mushroom-like black cloud from a major fire triggered by two explosions in Cossack Bay, in the Crimean Peninsula. The blasts came at 4:20am and 4:21am local time (2.20am and 2.21am UK...

The 'scar' was seen as Putin attended a midnight Easter service in Moscow A prominent diagonal line is seen upwards from left to right on the despot's neck Intrigue has surfaced over a prominent 'scar' that was seen on Vladimir Putin's neck, adding to further speculation that the despot may be ill with cancer. The marking was seen as he clasped a candle at a midnight Orthodox Easter cathedral service in Moscow at the weekend. It has led to web discussion on whether it represents proof of credible claims initially made by Proekt [Project] media one year ago that Putin...

Putin sacked Admiral Sergei Avakyants, 66, the commander of his Pacific Fleet His sacking is a sign that Putin had detected a failure in military exercises Vladimir Putin today dramatically fired an admiral in charge of his Pacific Fleet in a sign that the Russian despot is furious that military drills that were meant to send a message of strength to the West were a flop. Putin sacked Admiral Sergei Avakyants, 66, the commander of his Pacific Fleet, as the vast military drills he had apparently overseen were still underway. The move to axe Avakyants was confirmed by Deputy Prime...

A leading crony of Vladimir Putin has urged him to stop the war now and tell the world Russia has achieved the aims of its 'special military operation', including decimating 'a large part of the active male population of Ukraine'. Yevgeny Prigozhin - head of the Wagner mercenary army deployed by the Kremlin - posted a rambling statement online last night in which he made the surprise call for the war to stop. He claimed Russia had taken a 'fat chunk' of Ukrainian territory, and that the most strategic route for its armed forces - who have suffered severe losses...

Gleb Karakulov, 35, is a captain in the Federal Guard Service, known as the FGS or FSO, who escaped Russia...Putin is so paranoid about his personal security, assassination attempts and health and that he opts to stay 'in his bunker'...Karakulov added that the Russian despot is 'mortally afraid' of Covid and is isolating for the fourth year, and that he never uses a mobile phone out of fear of being bugged...highest ranking defector so far from Putin's immediate security circle...He added: 'I can tell you that I went on many business trips with him, and he went on many trips...

He revealed Putin is 'mortally afraid' of Covid and is isolating for fourth year A protection officer who worked directly for Vladimir Putin has defected from Russia, labelling the Kremlin despot a 'war criminal' for his invasion of Ukraine. Gleb Karakulov, 35, is a captain in the Federal Guard Service, known as the FGS or FSO, who escaped Russia to the safety via Istanbul. 'With Putin… he doesn't use the internet or a mobile phone. He only receives information from his closest circle, which means that he lives in an information vacuum,' Karakulov said. This means his knowledge of events...

Russia's president Vladimir Putin, 70, is taking tanks as old as he is out of storage in his desperate bid to crush Ukraine on the battlefield. A video showing long obsolete Soviet-era T-54B and T-55A tanks - designed to be used in the armies of Soviet tyrant Josef Stalin - on a train carried across Russia, presumably destined for the frontlines of the war, has emerged. It comes with Putin having already raided museums and storage depots for retired T-62 battle tanks, which halted production 12 years ago. The geriatric T-54 was originally produced by Stalin after the Second World...