Russian oil executive who criticized Ukraine invasion dies after falling out of hospital window

The chairman of Russian oil giant Lukoil, who with his company had criticized the invasion of Ukraine, reportedly died on Thursday after falling from the sixth-floor window of a Moscow hospital.

Ravil Maganov died in what sources call a possible suicide after his body was found on the floor of Moscow’s elite Central Clinical Hospital, according to Russian reports.

A statement from Lukoil said Maganov “died after a serious illness”, but gave no further information.

Citing an unnamed police source, the official Tass news agency reported that Maganov committed suicide after being admitted to hospital with a heart attack. RBK news outlet also reported that police are investigating the president’s death as a possible suicide.

When Russia invaded Ukraine, Lukoil’s board was one of the few companies that called for a speedy end to the armed conflict, calling it a “tragedy” and expressing sympathy for its victims.

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Rebekah Koffler, a former Defense Intelligence Agency officer who authored “Putin’s Playbook,” told Fox News Digital that “we’ll never know exactly what happened to Maganov,” but noted that death by defenestration is ” a standard Russian intelligence manual” regarding doctrine. of “wet business”, the translation of a Russian term referring to operations that draw blood.

“‘Wet deals’ are targeted killings,” Koffler said. “Russia and previously the former Soviet Union are known to have orchestrated the mysterious deaths of opponents of the Kremlin. This is done in a variety of ways: bullets to the back of the neck, poisonings, forced suicides and other complex forms of violent death. I have a whole section in my book describing this doctrine and with high profile case examples.”

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Explaining that Russian news agencies are mostly controlled or at least influenced by the Russian government, Koffler noted that Russian media “couldn’t keep their story accurate today about what happened to Maganov.”

A view of the Central Clinical Hospital where Lukoil Chairman Ravil Maganov died of his injuries after falling from a sixth floor window in Moscow, Russia September 1, 2022.
(Evgenii Bugubaev/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

“Interfax said he died after falling from a window and Tass wrote it was a suicide. Another newspaper speculated that he was trying to climb out of a balcony to smoking. The truth is that these tactics are deliberately designed to be stealthy, so no investigator could identify foul play. They are generally considered “tragic accidents. That’s part of the doctrine, too.” , did she say.

Maganov’s death follows a similar mysterious death in August, when Soviet-born businessman and Putin critic Dan Rapoport allegedly jumped to his death from his upscale Washington, DC apartment. Like Maganov, Rapoport had publicly criticized the Russian invasion of Ukraine. A former Lukoil senior executive was found dead in the basement of a Moscow suburban residence in May.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.