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We knew these denials were coming and now they are here. A Kremlin spokesman called the suggestion that Putin ordered Prigozhin’s death an “absolute lie.”
The Kremlin on Friday heatedly denied blame for the presumed death of the mercenary chief Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, dismissing the idea that the Russian government had destroyed a business jet reportedly carrying Mr. Prigozhin as Western propaganda aimed at smearing President Vladimir V. Putin.
“An absolute lie,” said Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman…
“I would suggest focusing on the facts and not what is being said by the Western media,” [foreign minister Sergey] Lavrov told Russian state media…
Mr. Lukashenko, who relies heavily on political and economic support from his Russian counterpart, said, “Knowing Putin, how scrupulous, cautious, accurate he is, I do not believe that he would do this,” according to the Belarusian state news agency Belta.
Lukashenko’s denial is especially funny because back in June when he was eager to take credit for brokering peace between Prigozhin and Putin, he said outright that Putin wanted to have Prigozhin killed.
According to Lukashenko, it started with an exasperated Putin who called and informed him what was happening. “I…understood that a tough decision had been made, you could hear it beneath Putin’s speech: To wipe them out,” Lukashenko said. But he added, “I advised Putin not to rush.
