A TOP Russian ballet dancer who slammed Vladimir Putin for his war against Ukraine has been found dead.
International star performer Vladimir Shklyarov, 39, fell from a fifth-floor balcony of his residential block in St Petersburg.
Vladimir Shklyarov, 39, tragically died after falling from a balcony of his apartment in St Petersburg[/caption]
Tributes were paid to the ballet dancer near his home[/caption]
He had starred at the Metropolitan Opera in New York and the Royal Opera House in London.
Shklyarov was reportedly leaping between two balconies when he fell to his death.
Local reports suggest he was trying to escape from his apartment where his ex-wife ballerina Maria Shirinkina had locked him – at his request – to stop him from buying drugs.
The reports added he was suffering from drug and alcohol addiction problems.
The couple – recently divorced – had a young son and daughter.
Irina Bartnovskaya, a fellow ballerina, gave a different account of her death.
She said Shklyarovwas was on painkillers and preparing for foot surgery before his death.
“He went out to smoke on a very narrow balcony and fell five stories in a stupid, unbearable accident,” the fellow dancer added.
She insisted: “He loved life, family, adored his children and his audience.”
It was also revealed he had written to his doctor shortly before his death, saying: “We have to operate. I am not ready, but there is no other way out. I can’t stand this pain.”
Meanwhile, Shklyarov was known to be a powerful critic of Putin’s war in Ukraine.
In 2022, he had posted defiantly: “Friends! I am against the war in Ukraine!
“I am for the people, for a peaceful sky above our heads.
“Politicians should be able to negotiate without shooting and killing civilians, for this they were given a tongue and a head.
“My grandfather, Anatoly Filimonovich, graduated from school in Ukraine with a gold medal, my great-grandmother Sonya lived her whole life in Kyiv.
“It is impossible to watch everything that is happening today without tears…
“I want to dance…I want to love everyone – that is the purpose of my life…
“I do not want wars or borders.”
It is unclear if his war criticism could be related to his death though many Putin critics have suffered unexplained early deaths.
CRITICS DROPPING DEAD
Over the years, a long list of Putin critics have died under mysterious circumstances.
They include oligarch and political fixer Boris Berezovsky, found hanged in his Berkshire home in 2013, and his associate Nikolai Glushkov found dead from compression to the neck five years later.
Putin’s secret services poisoned former FSB agent Alexander Litvinenko with deadly radioactive polonium-210 in London in 2008.
He died but an attempt to kill Sergei Skripal, a former Russian military intelligence officer who spied for the UK, failed despite the use of nerve agent Novichok.
Just a few days ago, a popular Russian TV chef who fled to London after opposing the war was found dead in a Belgrade hotel.
In December 2023, Vladimir Egorov, an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, plunged to his death from a third-floor window in Moscow.
The 46-year-old Egorov was a wealthy and prominent politician in oil-rich Tobolsk in western Siberia.
Just weeks prior, the deputy editor of Putin’s favourite propaganda newspaper was found dead aged only 35.
The body of Anna Tsareva, 35, was discovered at her home in the capital’s Bolshoy Tishinsky Lane – nearly a year after the death of her boss Vladimir Sungorkin, 68.
In February of the same year, a top Russian defence official and a key figure in the funding of Putin’s illegal war in Ukraine Marina Yankina, 58, also fell 160ft to her death in St Petersburg.
She was head of the financial support department of the Ministry of Defence for the Western Military District, which is closely involved in the dictator’s invasion.
Earlier this year, the chief editor of the warmonger’s state-run TV empire was also discovered lifeless after a suspected poisoning.
Zoya Konovalova, 48, who ran a channel operating near the frontlines of Mad Vlad’s illegal war, was found alongside her ex-husband.
He slammed Putin for his war against Ukraine[/caption]