Photographer - Ksenia Sobchak
(Allegedly Putin's goddaughter, but not a supporter of him)
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“I love Putin as a man who saved my father but I don’t respect his politics right now…” (Interview to RT, 14 Feb. 2012)
She wouldn’t go too much into details but the story that Ksenia refers to goes back to the 1990s, when Vladimir Putin helped his former boss Anatoly Sobchak, suspected of abuse of power and corruption in St Petersburg, to get to Paris secretly.
Photo by Anton Tushin from http://www.ridus.ru/news/16364/
Photo by Anton Tushin from http://www.ridus.ru/news/16364/
“That saved Sobchak from a trial and perhaps from being thoroughly discredited if he had been found guilty of misdeeds. Getting Sobchak into France was a military operation that involved the special services, a chartered plane, and the covering of tracks”. (from “Putin’s Russia”, book written by Lilia Shevtsova, published by the Carnegie Endowment)
That link from the past made Putin the best friend of the family for many years. He was even said to have cried when he attended the funeral of Anatoly Sobchak in 2000. Rumors have it, Putin is also Ksenia’s godfather, although she’d never comment on this. With her mother still a loyal senator, many saw her criticism of Putin as a personal betrayal.
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moar:
https://russiapedia.rt.com/prominent-russians/entertainment/ksenia-sobchak/index.html