Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov on Friday denied rumors of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s death which had spread on social media, calling them a hoax.
Information that Putin had died and that a doppelgänger had taken over his post is “an absurd information canard,” Peskov told Russian state-owned newswire RIA Novosti on Friday.
This is the second time this week that the Kremlin official has had to dismiss speculation about Putin’s health.
An unverified report that Putin had gone into cardiac arrest, published on a Telegram channel on Sunday evening, got the rumor mill going — forcing Peskov to firmly deny the claim.
“Everything is fine with him,” Peskov originally said on Tuesday.
There is a great deal of secrecy around the personal life and health of Putin — who seeks to project a strongman image to the public — which has been a topic of speculation for years.
So far, Russian authorities have almost invariably denied the rumors surrounding Putin’s health — with one notable exception.
In 2018, after he disappeared for two days just weeks before a crucial presidential election, Peskov made the rare admission that the president had “a cold” which he blamed on “winter.”
