Violent and Mysterious Deaths of Putin’s Critics: A Warning and Shocking Secrets Exposed

Vladimir Putin has been in power for nearly 25 years, ruling Russia with complete control. When someone stays in power for that long, it’s natural for people to oppose them, criticize their leadership, or challenge their decisions. However, what’s strange about Putin’s critics and political opponents is that many of them have died under mysterious or violent circumstances.

One of the most recent and well-known figures to die after standing up to Putin was Alexei Navalny. Navalny was a Russian activist and opposition leader. He became famous for exposing corruption among high-ranking Russian officials and founded the Anti-Corruption Foundation. He was one of Putin’s strongest critics and was arrested multiple times because of his activism.

Navalny died in February while being held in a remote Russian prison in Siberia. His treatment in prison was harsh—he was frequently placed in a punishment cell, deprived of proper food, and exposed to extreme cold. Many world leaders, including then-U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, called his death an assassination. Harris directly blamed Putin and the Kremlin, saying they were responsible for his suffering and ultimate death.

But Navalny wasn’t the only one. Many of Putin’s critics have met brutal ends—through poisonings, shootings, and even a plane crash. Here are some of the most notable cases.

Litvinenko was a former Russian intelligence officer who turned against Putin and sought asylum in the UK. In 2006, he died after being poisoned with polonium-210, a rare and highly radioactive substance. The poisoning happened in London, and a British investigation later found that Russian agents were behind his murder—most likely acting on orders from Putin. Before his death, Litvinenko had warned that Russian security services were still operating Soviet-era poison laboratories.

Anna Politkovskaya was a journalist known for her investigative work criticizing Putin and exposing abuses in Chechnya under the leadership of Ramzan Kadyrov. She was one of Russia’s most respected reporters.

In 2006, she was shot dead in her apartment building in Moscow. Her murder sent shockwaves through the journalism community in Russia. Five people were arrested for the killing, but authorities never determined who ordered the assassination. Putin publicly stated that he wanted her killers caught, but at the same time, he downplayed her influence, saying her work had little impact on Russian society.

Boris Nemtsov was a prominent opposition leader and a former Deputy Prime Minister of Russia under Boris Yeltsin. Many believed he had the potential to become Russia’s president one day.

In 2015, while walking near the Kremlin, he was shot four times in the back by an unidentified gunman. Five men from Chechnya were later arrested for the crime, but Nemtsov’s allies insisted that Putin and the Kremlin had orchestrated the killing. A joint investigation by the BBC, Bellingcat, and The Insider revealed that Russian intelligence agents had been secretly tracking Nemtsov for nearly a year before his assassination. Some of these agents were also linked to poisoning attempts on other Putin critics.

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the former leader of the Wagner paramilitary group, was once a close ally of Putin but later fell out of favor. In 2023, he led a brief rebellion against the Russian government, marching his troops toward Moscow. Although he later agreed to a truce and relocated his forces to Belarus, his fate was sealed.

Just two months after the failed mutiny, Prigozhin’s private jet exploded in midair, killing him along with his field commander Dmitry Utkin and eight others. Many suspected foul play, believing Putin ordered his death as punishment for the rebellion. After his death, Putin publicly acknowledged his long history with Prigozhin, saying he had made “serious mistakes” but also contributed to Russia’s interests. Shortly after, Wagner troops were forced to swear allegiance to the Russian government.

Boris Berezovsky was a powerful businessman and former Kremlin insider who later became one of Putin’s loudest critics. He fled Russia and lived in the UK, where he repeatedly spoke out against Putin’s rule.

In 2013, he was found hanged in his bathroom in his home in Ascot, England. His death was ruled as “unexplained,” but many believed it wasn’t a suicide. Strangely, several of his associates also died under suspicious circumstances.

Among them were:

• Nikolai Glushkov, a Georgian businessman, found dead in London in 2018.
• Yuri Golubev, co-founder of Yukos Oil, who died mysteriously in 2007.
• Badri Patarkatsishvili, another Georgian oligarch, who was found dead in London in 2008.

These cases paint a chilling picture of what happens to those who challenge Putin’s power. While Russian authorities often deny involvement, the pattern of deaths among opposition figures suggests a clear and ruthless method of eliminating threats to the Kremlin’s rule.