Kremlin boss sick?

Ex-ARD correspondent comments on rumors about Putin - and fears "escalation"

Created: 06/10/2022, 05:38

By: Franziska Schwarz

Recording from June 7: Vladimir Putin in a video conference © Mikhail Metzel/Imago

Udo Lielischkies, a former ARD correspondent in Moscow and adept at Russia, was a guest at “Sandra Maischberger”.

He took the question of Vladimir Putin's health seriously.

Berlin - Speculations about Vladimir Putin's health have reached public broadcasters.

Sandra Maischberger spoke to her in her ARD talk on June 8th - but quickly asked a follow-up question that made the exchange on the subject seem justified.

After all, your interlocutor was Udo Lielischkies, who knows Russia and has been an ARD correspondent in Moscow for many years.

And Maischberger waited until minute 12 of a total of 15, until she casually asked: "Are these all just rumours?" comes."

Lielischkies also pointed out that the rumors about Putin's health were no longer only spread by the tabloid media - but played it safe: "But these are small pieces of the mosaic.

I can't give you a clear verdict on that.

But I can also well imagine that there is something there.”

Possible Putin disease: Question to ex-ARD Moscow correspondent Lielischkies at "Maischberger"

"They would go so far as to say he might not be completely healthy," Maischberger summarized the fact that Lielischkies ultimately has no clear answer to the question of Putin's health.

But what would a possible illness of Putin mean for the course of the Ukraine war," she asked, "if there is someone who knows that they don't have much time?"

"If that were the case, it would be a further aggravation of the situation.

Surrounded by a few hawks, FSB people, older men, who grew up in the police state and this secret service culture..." Lielischkies was convinced that Putin would not get involved in Ukraine-Russia negotiations so quickly "unless he was militarily humiliated." Lielischkies therefore advocated faster arms deliveries from Germany and the West to Ukraine.

The background to the rumors about Putin's health, which Lielischkies was also aware of at Maischberger: Secret service agents report that the Kremlin chief has to split up meetings and see the rumors of blood cancer as either a diversionary maneuver or an internal power struggle.

A team of Russian journalists had researched which doctors had been with Putin for how long.