As of: February 23, 2024, 4:30 a.m
By: Nadja Zinsmeister
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Press
Split
A Russian military blogger has been found dead after making critical comments about the Kremlin.
He had reported on the battle for Avdiivka.
Moscow - Shortly after the death of Russian opposition leader Andrei Navalny, another death is causing a stir in Russia.
As several Russian media and Telegram channels report, former soldier and independent military blogger Andrei Morozov is said to have died on Wednesday (February 21).
Shortly before his death, Morozov had spread information about heavy Russian losses in the fighting for the eastern Ukrainian city of Avdiivka and apparently refused to remove it from public view.
Andrei Morozov had already fought as a soldier in Ukraine in 2014 and was most recently known as a Kremlin-critical blogger under the pseudonym “Murz”.
As the
Meduza
news portal reports, lawyer Maxim Pashkov confirmed his death on Wednesday.
According to initial information, the miliblogger is said to have committed suicide.
In addition to the lawyer's statement, this fact is also suggested by a farewell letter that Morozow is said to have published shortly before his death.
According to information from the
Institute for the Study of War
(ISW), the military blogger claimed to have received orders from a Russian officer on February 20 to remove a February 19 report on the Ukraine war.
Famous military blogger in Russia dies after public criticism of losses in Ukraine war
In the report, “Murz” wrote that 16,000 Russian soldiers died during the Russian offensives around Avdiivka.
The Russian Ministry of Defense has not released any official figures on losses among its own ranks since September 2022.
Russian soldiers in the eastern Ukrainian city of Avdiivka.
According to estimates, Russia's capture of the area cost many soldiers' lives.
© IMAGO/Stanislav Krasilnikov
The officer apparently threatened to cut off Morozov's unit from supplies of ammunition and military equipment if he did not withdraw his report.
In his farewell letter, the military blogger assumed that the officer, in turn, was following orders from the Russian political leadership and propagandists.
According to ISW information, he wrote that he “could no longer serve under this abusive officer.”
He tried for a long time to uncover the truth about the Ukraine war.
Morozov also hinted at a possible conspiracy by the Russian authorities against him.
He assumed that plans to murder or arrest him could already be underway.
The background is the growing pressure on voices critical of the Kremlin in Russia.
Officials have been increasingly targeting radical milibloggers for some time.
Some of them, who had expressed similar criticism to Morozov, were arrested.
Pressure is growing on military bloggers in Russia - what the death of Andrei Morozov means for the country
The circumstances of the military blogger's death cannot be independently confirmed.
However, the ISW expects that the Russian's alleged suicide will have a positive effect on the Kremlin's efforts to monopolize information about the country and make it part of its propaganda by covering up negative developments in the Ukraine war.
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Andrei Morozov had been reporting independently on events in Ukraine since the beginning of the war.
Among other things, he warned in the summer of 2022 of severely depleted Russian forces in the eastern Ukrainian Kharkiv Oblast, just months before a successful Ukrainian counteroffensive in the region in September 2022.
Note: As a general rule, we do not report on suicides so that such cases do not encourage possible imitators. Reporting only takes place if the circumstances receive particular public attention. If you or someone you know needs help, please contact the telephone counseling service on
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