Russia Arrests 26-Year-Old Female Suspect In Killing Of Prominent Pro-War Blogger
Russian authorities have arrested a suspect in connection to the recent death of one of the nation’s most prominent pro-war bloggers, RadarOnline.com has learned.
On Monday, shortly after 40-year-old Vladlen Tatarsky was killed in an explosion on Sunday night inside a St. Petersburg café, the Russian Investigative Committee (RIC) announced they arrested 26-year-old Daria Trepova in connection to Tatarsky’s murder.
According to the RIC, Tatarsky was holding an event at the café in the center of St. Petersburg on Sunday night when he received a bust of himself that contained explosives.
Shortly after, the bust exploded and killed Tatarsky. At least 30 other individuals were injured in the blast.
Russia’s National Anti-Terrorism Committee has since claimed Ukraine’s security services were behind Tatarsky’s murder on Sunday night, and that “agents” working for jailed Putin critic Alexei Navalny were also involved.
Russia’s Interior Ministry has also released a video in which Trepova, after being detained, seemingly admits to being the one who handed Tatarsky the “figurine” that ultimately exploded and took his life.
“I brought a figurine that exploded,” the 26-year-old reportedly said in the video, although she refused to disclose who gave her the figurine to give to Tatarsky.
As RadarOnline.com previously reported, Tatarsky was one of many Russian personalities who used their online platform to support Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine and push “propaganda” defending Vladimir Putin’s position in the war.
“We’ll defeat everybody, kill everybody, rob everybody we need to,” the 40-year-old pro-war blogger said in one video before his death. “It will all be the way we like it.”
Andrei Kolesnikov, an analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, spoke out after Tatarsky’s death on Sunday and claimed people like Tatarsky have only risen to fame “because of the war.”
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Kolesnikov also claimed that while bloggers like Tatarsky could make careers out of their pro-war commentary and propaganda, the positions “came with risks” similar to what took place in St. Petersburg over the weekend.
"[Tatarsky’s death] draws attention to this new category of aggressive supporters of the war and those who take part in it, who, of course, are not journalists at all, but propagandists,” Kolesnikov told NBC News on Monday.
“From the point of view of today’s authorities and propaganda, these are extremely useful people,” he added.