Two prominent supporters of adding that he doesn’t remember the conversation but that the “this whole story is extremely unpleasant” for him.
An unnamed source in Russia’s FSB security agency has allegedly confirmed the authenticity of the tape, telling iStories that “the FSB leadership recently held a meeting and instructed subordinates to take action” on the scandal.
Akhmedov, a billionaire, was sanctioned by the European Union in April last year as a close ally to the Kremlin and a “leading businessperson involved in economic sectors providing a substantial source of revenue to the government of the Russian Federation.” He’s famously desperate to get his $460 million yacht back after it was frozen in a German port, even attempting to distance himself from Putin to meet that end.
Prigozhin, the famous music producer, has been a longtime supporter of the Russian president—at least publicly. “I’m in shock now and don’t understand how to live with this shit,” he said in his interview with Fontanka after the scandal broke out, in which he described Putin as a “planetary figure.”
