Russian journalist Sobchak flees Russia after her detention ordered – Russian media
Propaganda media reported that Sobchak has left Russia, her house had been searched (Photo:xenia_sobchak/Instagram)
Russian journalist Ksenia Sobchak fled Russia for Lithuania via Belarus overnight on Oct. 26 after investigators issued an order for her detention, Russian state news agency TASS has reported.
“The law enforcement officers had an investigator’s order to detain Sobchak, but she managed to escape,” the TASS report on the Telegram messenger, reads referring to a source in the Russian police.
Sobchak is assumed to have fled after learning that the security forces would try to detain her in on the afternoon of Oct. 26 on suspicion of extortion.
It is also reported that before leaving for Lithuania, the journalist bought two flight tickets to Dubai to confuse operatives and avoid detention.
“At the same time, she bought flight tickets online to Dubai yesterday, and to Turkey today,” TASS said.
“She did this to confuse the operatives. Following that, she entered Lithuania via Belarus.”
Russian Telegram messengers reported that Sobchak’s country house had been searched early on Oct. 26 after the Russian police had arrested her commercial director, Kirill Sukhanov, a day earlier.
He is a suspect in the extortion case.
Three days ago, Sobchak posted on Instagram a photo taken in Moscow, noting that she “loves Moscow autumn.”
Sobchak is the daughter of the first democratically elected mayor of Saint Petersburg, the late Anatoly Sobchak, a close associate of now Russian dictator Vladimir Putin in the 1990s in Saint Petersburg. Putin is said to have helped Sobchak flee Russia in 1997 when the latter was wanted on corruption charges, and in 1999, when Putin became Russian prime minister, the charges were dropped and Sobchak was able to return to Russia.
Ksenia Sobchak is reported to have received an Israeli passport in April 2022. She has previously criticized Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine.
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