Russian exile's death in London is suspicious, friends claim

Friends of the Russian exile found dead in his London home on Monday said they believed his death to be suspicious, adding that he had shown no signs of depression in recent months and was “in a perfect mood”.

Nikolai Glushkov’s body was found by his daughter Natalya at his house in New Malden, Kingston upon Thames. There were signs of “suffocation”, the Russian newspaper Kommersant reported. Glushkov, 68, lived alone.

Counter-terrorism police are leading the investigation into his death because of Glushkov’s association with the oligarch Boris Berezovsky, who died in 2013. The Metropolitan police say there is currently no evidence to suggest a link between Glushkov’s case and the poisoning of Sergei Skripal in Salisbury.

Glushkov was a prominent opponent of the Kremlin. He spent five years in jail in Russia before escaping to the UK in 2004. He was a director of Aeroflot, the state airline, and worked closely with Berezovsky in the 1980s and 90s.

At the time of his death, Glushkov was about to defend a claim against him by Aeroflot at the commercial court in London, where he was accused by the Russian authorities of fraud. One friend, who declined to be named, said he had spent months preparing for the case.


Source: theguardian