The killing of Russian dissident Maxim Kuzminov this week has rocked Spain.
As the Dagbladet newspaper wrote on Tuesday, the former Russian helicopter pilot was found shot to death in a parking lot in the town of Villajoyosa near Alicante.
Now the murder has become more closely linked to the regime of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
– Unmatched
“Spanish intelligence has no doubt that the long arm of the Kremlin is behind it,” he wrote. El Pais.
The large, reputable newspaper adds that the murder is an unparalleled crime in Spain.
Travel to Ukraine: Helicopter pilot Maxim Kuzminov defected from the Russian army last August. Photo: Defense Intelligence of Ukraine
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The dissident was found in a parking lot on February 13, just days before opposition politician Alexei Navalny died in captivity in Russia, but the news only became known this week.
Kuzminov is said to have been shot 13 times. Spanish media reported earlier this week that investigators were searching for two suspects who fled in a car. This car was later found burned in a nearby town.
The death list is long
According to the report, Kuzminov withdrew from the study in August last year Sky News. He was on his way from one Russian air base to another, but the Russian plane landed instead in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv.
The latest deaths make the list longer, of Russian dissidents and dissidents who have lost their lives, often in mysterious circumstances.
The attack: This was supposedly the getaway car after the murder of Maxim Kuzminov, and it was found burned out in El Campello, Spain, on February 14, the day after Kuzminov was found dead. Photo: Alex Dominguez/Informacion.es/REUTERS/NTB Scanpix
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Among the most famous are journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who was shot dead in Moscow in 2006, KGB defector Alexander Litvinenko, who was poisoned in London the same year, and opposition politician Boris Nemtsov, who was shot dead in Moscow in 2015.
– As in The Godfather
In August last year, the head of the Russian army's Wagner Group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, also died in a plane crash, after entering into conflict with Putin's regime.
– This looks like in (the movie) The Godfather, says author and researcher Mira Milosevic at the Spanish research center Real Instituto Elcano. El Pais.
– It is a mafia, more than just the government of a serious democratic country, you say.
Confirmation of deaths
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