There’s no retirement plan for the Kremlin leader.

Yevgenyia Albats, a Russian writer, investigative journalist and former editor-in-chief of the New Times, is confident that President Vladimir Putin will end up being killed by someone from his inner circle of allies. 

Speaking to the TV Rain channel (Dozhd) about the future of the Kremlin leader, Albats said she would like to see Putin defending himself in the Hague International Criminal Court, but this is very unlikely. 

“I’d like to see him hearing on the crimes he has committed […] and yet, considering what we know, as it is customary in African countries… that used to be a Latin American style, someone from his inner circle will surely terminate him.

Either they come to agreement that he (Putin) keeps a low profile and accepts a retirement plan,” she said, adding that “this is unlikely, because everyone is afraid of the retirement option.”

Yevgenyia Albats, a friend of the murdered opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, left Russia in September 2022 over fears of arrest for her critical views of the Russian invasion in Ukraine. She isn’t really welcome in Ukraine too, due to her negative remarks about Kiev’s handling of Crimea. Albats lectures now at a New York university; she had earned a doctor’s degree at Harvard University.