Vladimir Putin was mocked by Ukraine today for allegedly sending a lookalike to war-torn Mariupol during a high-security visit.
Kiev official Anton Gerashchenko posted three images of Putin’s chin, questioning whether they belonged to the same man.
He jeered, “What’s the matter with your chin, Putin?”
The Interior Minister’s adviser posted: ‘It seems his make-up artists (i.e. for the bunkerman’s recent trips to occupied Crimea and Mariupol) have had to work with a rather low-quality copy, not even a double one, as of late but its copy. I wonder which one of them was real?’
A photo showed Putin, 70, addressing the Federal Assembly in Moscow a month ago.
Putin a month ago in Moscow (left), his trip to Sevastopol on March 18 (center) and his visit to Mariupol on March 19 (right)
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Another example was Putin’s visit to the naval port of Sevastopol in Crimea on March 18.
And the third was of footage released the next day that clearly showed the dictator in war-ravaged Mariupol.
The first image showed his chin tight and precise.
But the Sevastopol image – taken from Ukraine in 2014 – caused a drooping chin, while Mariupol’s chin appears firmer, but less so than in the Moscow photo.
A Russian source said: ‘He has those moments where he looks like a babushka [grandmother] without teeth.’
There are repeated claims that Putin uses body doubles on some trips outside of Moscow, or when many people are around.
Telegram broadcaster General SVR today emphasized that Putin had not been to Sevastopol or Mariupol, a city that was invaded last year after a bloody battle.
“The information from Kremlin sources that Vladimir Putin visited Crimea and Mariupol is NOT true,” the channel claimed, claiming insider sources.
In Crimea, a double of the president was spotted with a short visit and only for the sake of a video photo shoot.’
The doppelgänger was “forbidden to have meaningful conversations and long meetings, for fear of embarrassment or the like” [mistake] of the substitute.’
The Russian anti-Putin channel claimed: “The same applies to the visit to Mariupol.
‘The doppelgänger has been filmed [but]didn’t talk much and didn’t stay anywhere for long.’
In Mariupol, the president was seen on a nighttime ride without a seatbelt with little visible security.
The ‘spontaneous’ rides of ‘Putin’ around Mariupol behind the wheel, without blocking the streets, without a column of guards, and going ‘to the people’ in the occupied frontline city is not only unrealistic, it is even not funny.
“The president was many hundreds of miles away at the time, warm and perfectly safe.”
Putin with his “pathological cowardice” was not “risking his precious life.”
Telegram broadcaster General SVR today emphasized that Putin had not been to Sevastopol or Mariupol, a city that was invaded last year after a bloody battle. Pictured: Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks today at an annual expanded meeting of the board of directors of the Russian Interior Ministry in Moscow
The channel claimed: “Putin has been actively using a doppelgänger lately and is increasingly becoming a ‘fake’ president.
“The whole country is already laughing at the understudy’s inconsistency with the original” in looks, behavior and habits.
Instead, the real Putin was “under treatment” preparing for today’s state visit by Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
It was also alleged that Putin had encountered looters in Mariupol when he was greeted by locals who had been given new housing.
Mariupol.Sprotiv channel identified a pensioner who showed the president his new flat as Nikolay Lotkov, 70.
Next to him were his son Dmitry and daughter-in-law Ekaterina, who Ukrainian sources claimed were involved in looting during last year’s siege of Mariupol.
Another woman Putin met, named Irina Volosatova, is also accused of looting.
She thanked Putin for taking over the city and creating “a little piece of paradise.”
But a source told the resistance magazine: “She and her family looted my parents’ flat, and our neighbor’s flat from a floor above. “Her whole family was looting and threatening my parents.”
Still, this can only deepen the suggestion that this was a Putin doppelgänger, as protesters normally never go near the dictator.
She could be heard yelling, “It’s all lies, it’s all just for show.”
Still, this can only reinforce the suggestion that this was a Putin doppelgänger, as protesters normally never go near the dictator.
A security guard is ringed as she searches the barracks – but few officers were visible in Mariupol during his ‘spontaneous’ journey into the city.
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