Pavel Antov, Russian sausage tycoon who criticized Ukraine war, dies in fall
Yaron Steinbuch
A Russian sausage tycoon who criticized the invasion of Ukraine plunged to his death from a luxury hotel in India — three days after his friend lost his life on the same trip.
Pavel Antov, who was reportedly celebrating his upcoming 66th birthday, was found dead outside the Hotel Sai International in Rayagada, the UK’s Telegraph reported.
According to Russian state media, Antov, who was also a politician,died in a fall from his third-floor window at the swanky hotel.
His passing on Sunday is the latest in a series of mysterious deaths involving Russian tycoons since the start of strongman Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine.
On Thursday, Antov’s friend Vladimir Bidenov died at the same hotel after he was found lying unconscious in his room surrounded by empty wine bottles, according to the news outlet.
Police Superintendent Vivekananda Sharma said Bidenov suffered a stroke and that his pal “was depressed after his death and he too died,” the BBC reported. (Kek, that’s a pathetic explanation)
Alexei Idamkin, the Russian consul in Kolkata, told the Tass news agency that investigators did not see a “criminal element in these tragic events,” according to the BBC.
“We are aware of the tragedy that happened in Odisha, where two of our citizens died. One of them is Pavel Antov, member of the Legislative Assembly of the Vladimir Oblast,” the Russian embassy in India told local outlet NDTV.
“We are in constant contact with the relatives of the deceased as well as with local authorities. As far as we know,police do not yet see a criminal component in these tragic events,” it added.
A senior police official said Antov’s death appeared to be a case of suicide, news agency PTI reported.
The wealthy member of Putin’s United Russia party was chairman of the agriculture committee at the legislature in Russia’s Vladimir region, the Telegraph reported.
Antov was the founder of sausage producer Vladimir Standard and the country’s top-earning lawmaker, according to Russian Forbes, which put his annual income at almost $156 million.
In July, Antov slammed the Kremlin’s missile attacks on Kyiv as terrorism on WhatsApp, where he posted a story about a girl who had been pulled out of the rubble at her demolished home.
“It’s extremely difficult to call all this anything but terror,” he wrote.
Antov quickly apologized for the message, saying it had been posted by someone else and that he was “a supporter of the president and my country’s patriot” and “shared the goals” of the invasion.
Several Russian magnates have died under strange circumstances since the invasion began.
In September, the head of Russia’s oil giant Lukoil, Ravil Maganov, reportedly fell from a hospital window in Moscow.
https://nypost.com/2022/12/27/pavel-antov-russian-sausage-tycoon-who-criticized-ukraine-war-dies-in-fall/