Paranoid Putin lies to his own guards about his whereabouts

Paranoid Putin lies to his own guards about his whereabouts to avoid being assassinated and has a bodyguard operate his washing machine, Russian defector claims

• Putin is so paranoid he will be assassinated that he lies to guards about location

Vladimir Putin is so paranoid he will be assassinated that he lies to his own bodyguards about his whereabouts to avoid being targeted, a Russian defector has claimed.

Putin has also increased his security at Olivye, one of his secret palaces in Crimea, since his invasion of Ukraine – so much so that he has a bodyguard operate his watching machine, former security officer Vitaly Brizhaty said.

Brizhaty, who now lives in Ecuador after defecting from the service, said armed divers were deployed to swim around the Russian warmonger’s private beaches looking for assassins.

‘This is how much he fears for his life,’ Brizhaty, who worked as a dog handler for the Federal Protection Service at Olivye, told TV Rain, a broadcaster which has been exiled from Russia. 

Brizhaty said that Putin is so paranoid about his safety – and who he can trust – that he often lied to his own bodyguards and gave them false information about how he was travelling to Crimea and where he was staying.

Putin has also increased his security at Olivye, one of his secret palaces in Crimea, since his invasion of Ukraine – so much so that he has a bodyguard operate his watching machine, former security officer Vitaly Brizhaty (pictured) said

Brizhaty said that Putin (pictured today) is so paranoid about his safety – and who he can trust – that he often lied to his own bodyguards and gave them false information about how he was travelling to Crimea and where he was staying

‘People were told “he’s resting at the dacha” and everybody is running around guarding him but he could be in another place altogether,’ he said, adding that the number of guard dogs surrounding the Olivye has been tripled to six since Putin invaded Ukraine more than 18 months ago. 

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Brizhaty, who defected from Russia because he was against the war in Ukraine, added: ‘Look at the people working in these dachas. Even the position of washing machine operator had to be staffed by an officer.’

The former guard added that civilian contractors were largely banned from the palace, described as a luxury ‘mini-city’, and staff were forced to hand in their mobile phones over fears of plots to assassinate Putin. 

Describing Olivye palace, Brizhaty said: ‘It’s a fantasy place. There are fitness halls, fountains, beautiful parks, tea hours, barbeque zones and breaches.’ 

He added that Russia’s former president Dmitry Medvedev and Alexander Bortnikov, the head of Russia’s FSB security service, have properties nearby. 

Brizhaty’s testimony of how paranoid Putin is echoes that of other guards who have defected since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine began. 

A former Russian intelligence officer claimed earlier this year that Putin had set up identical offices across Russia to confuse assassins in another sign the despot is paranoid about his safety. 

Putin designed offices in his luxury mansions in St Petersburg, Sochi and Novo-Ogaryovo to look the same, according to Gleb Karakulov, an officer in the Kremlin leader’s secretive elite personal security service.

The rooms are identical, with matching details such as desk and wall hangings, and official reports sometimes say he’s in one place when he’s actually in another.

When Putin was in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, security officials would pretend he was leaving and deploy a plane and motorcade, when he was in fact still in the city, the defector revealed. 

Putin speaking to Andrey Kostin in his Novo-Ogaryovo office in 2017 

The Kremlin had released photos of his meeting claiming he was in Novo-Ogaryovo in 2020 when in fact he was in Sochi (pictured)

‘This is, firstly, a ruse to confuse foreign intelligence and secondly, to prevent any attempts on his life,’ Karakulov told the Dossier Center, a Russian investigative journalism project. 

This confirmed previous reports by Russian outlet Proekt Media that showed how Putin’s Sochi office and his residence in Novo-Ogaryovo near Moscow were identical. The Kremlin had released photos of his meeting claiming he was in Novo-Ogaryovo when in fact he was in Sochi. 

Karakulov depicted Putin as an increasingly isolated leader who lives in an ‘information vacuum’ in heavily guarded residences, which he called ‘bunkers’. 

The Russian president refuses to use a mobile phone out of fear of being bugged by the West and prefers to travel on a special armoured train because he is paranoid a plane can be tracked, Karakulov said. He added that Putin is ‘mortally afraid’ of Covid and is isolating for the fourth year. 

‘He’s simply afraid,’ Karakulov said. ‘He has shut himself off from the world. His take on reality has become distorted.’ 

He said Putin’s paranoia has deepened since he invaded Ukraine and detailed how the despot ordered a bunker to be set up at the Russian Embassy in Kazakhstan and secured with a secure communications line last October. 

‘It is a kind of paranoia,’ Karakulov said. ‘He is pathologically afraid for his life.’

Putin has also become so fearful he will be killed by a Ukrainian strike that he has set up air defence systems near his presidential palace in Yashereova and his official residence near Moscow.

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