The syndrome of sometimes superficially masked, sometimes simply mysterious deaths of Russian top managers leaves its traces not only in Russia but also in England, Spain, France, Dubai, India, and Argentina.
The intensity of strange deaths of Russian top managers over the past three years is striking, as if there is a return to the turbulent 1990s.
On September 1st, 2022, news came from the Central Clinical Hospital (CCH), where the political and business elite of Russia often receives treatment: 67-year-old chairman of the board of directors of Lukoil, Ravil Maganov, bid farewell to life.
The death of Ravil Maganov: Surveillance cameras were not functioning…
Project VCHK-OGPU noted that the top manager died around the time when the President of the Russian Federation arrived at the hospital to lay flowers at the coffin of former USSR leader Mikhail Gorbachev, who recently passed away in the same CCH.
Vladimir Putin decided not to attend the official funeral ceremony on September 3rd, he bid farewell to Gorbachev privately.
Maganov died a few hours before Putin’s arrival.
However, the Federal Security Service personnel accompanying Putin were fully entitled to instruct the Lukoil president’s bodyguards to leave the perimeter, which is highly likely.
According to one version, the top manager went out to smoke and accidentally fell down; his cigarette pack was found on the balcony.
His section of the hospital was not intended for patient visits. In addition, as reported by Baza, none of the surveillance cameras from the facade, where Maganov could have fallen, were functioning.
In the only photograph that circulated on the internet immediately after the death of Lukoil’s president, only a bag containing the body could be seen on the ground near the hospital wall.
Visually, it is impossible to determine that it contained Maganov’s body.
The media resource Readovka reported that the top manager’s body was not immediately taken to the morgue; most likely it was taken for forensic examination.
When due to sanctions Vagit Alekperov was forced to leave the post of president of Lukoil, a person was needed at the helm of the company who could be fully trusted. Maganov turned out to be the ideal candidate.
He traditionally supervised the oil and gas exploration block, serving as the first vice president of the company since 1994.
It was thanks to Maganov that the oil and gas provinces in the Caspian and Baltic Seas were developed, and the successful development of a modern oil project in the Komi Republic was initiated.
According to information available to The Sun, the oilman was killed at the order of Vladimir Putin.
Revelations tougher than the Panama Papers may emerge
Another suspicious aspect characterises the date of death: two weeks before the incident, the value of Lukoil shares began to rise, reaching maximum heights on September 1st since the beginning of May 2022 when the company notified the London Stock Exchange of the termination of listing and American Depositary Receipts (ADRs) – due to the counter-sanctions imposed by Russia, this step had to be abandoned.
According to data as of May 2021, ADRs accounted for 30.6% of Lukoil’s share capital.
Shortly before his death, Maganov became a co-owner of one of the world’s largest drilling businesses – the oilfield service company Razvitie.
In short, things were going extremely well for the top manager, and it is unlikely that this could have been the reason for his leap from the window. At the CCH, he was lying due to cardiovascular problems, quite common for someone of his age.
Two sources from the Reuters agency, well acquainted with Maganov, stated that it seems unlikely that he committed suicide.
In early March 2022, the Lukoil board of directors spoke out against the war.
“People who go to work in this sphere – oil, gas, resources – are predators from the start.
That’s the environment, with such competition, such, apparent cruelty, and with such a predatory approach. If anyone talks about intimidation, then precisely this category cannot be intimidated,” believes M. Maksakova, former State Duma deputy of the Russian Federation.
He is amazed at how investigators, journalists, and consumers of media products can believe in the “main versions” that mythologize the deaths of Russian top managers.
