There is chaos in the Kremlin as Vladimir Putin's reportedly declining health sees the Russian leader surrounded by doctors, an ex top British spy believes. Former government intelligence professional Christopher Steele believes the mysterious illness that has plagued Putin, 69, has left Moscow having to deal with the president's health and the war in Ukraine, the Mirror reports.
Speaking to LBC's Eddie Mair, Mr Steele, who ran the Russia desk at MI6 in London between 2006 and 2009, claimed Putin needed round-the-clock medical care. But the exact details of his conditions were not known, even to high-ranking colleagues
He said: "He's constantly accompanied around the place by a team of doctors. Meetings of the security council that are shown to supposedly last for a whole hour are actually broken up into several sections, he goes out and receives some kind of medical treatment between those sections.
"So, clearly, he is seriously ill - how terminal or incurable it is is not clear, we can't be entirely sure.
"But it's certainly having a very serious impact on the governance of Russia at the moment."
There has been a string of claims about the health of the Kremlin leader, with some reports suggesting he is suffering from cancer, undergoing chemotherapy and steroid treatment among other ailments.
Steele's comments come after Ukrainian Major General Kyrylo Budanov also said the Russian leader is seriously ill with cancer and that an operation to remove him is underway in Russia.
He added on LBC: "There's increasing disarray in the Kremlin and chaos in fact, that there's no clear political leadership coming from Putin who is increasingly ill, and that in the military's terms the structures of command and so on are not functioning as they should."
Mair then bluntly asks: "Do you think the wheels are coming off?"
The ex-spy then replied: "I do, yes."
Earlier this week, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said the UK is open to the idea of an international criminal tribunal trying Vladimir Putin and other Russian leaders over the war in Ukraine.
Asked on Times Radio by the Ukrainian MP Alexey Goncharenko if the UK would support the move, she said: “Well, we are very clear that Putin and all of those who’ve been behind the appalling war crimes that are being committed in Ukraine need to be held to account, and we’re working very closely with the ICC. We’ve sent support into Ukraine to help collect evidence, from witness statements to video evidence.
“I’ve talked to the Ukrainian government about this idea of a tribunal. We are open to the idea of a tribunal, we’re currently considering it, but what we want is the most effective way of prosecuting those people who have committed these appalling war crimes including rape, sexual violence, the indiscriminate targeting of civilians.
“If the tribunal will help to do that, then the UK is definitely considering supporting it.”
