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Hundreds of people, including the leader of Russia’s Wagner private militia group, attended the funeral of pro-war blogger Vladlen Tatarsky on Saturday.
The 40-year-old blogger, whose real name was Maxim Fomin, was accorded military honours including a gun salute and an army band at the funeral at Moscow’s Troyekurovskoye cemetery.
Tatarsky died after an explosion at a cafe on the bank of the Neva River in the heart of St Petersburg. Russian reports claimed the bomb was concealed in a statuette of the blogger given to him as a gift just before the explosion.
While Russia has blamed Ukraine for Tatarsky’s death, Ukraine has not taken responsibility for the blast and instead blamed “domestic terrorism” in Russia.
Tatarsky was known for his blustery pronouncements and ardent pro-war rhetoric. He was among hundreds of attendees at a lavish Kremlin ceremony last September to proclaim Russia’s annexation of four partly occupied regions of Ukraine, a move that most countries have condemned as illegal.
Meanwhile, Russia’s campaign to break Ukraine’s energy system has “likely failed”, according to British intelligence.
