SOCHI, October 5. /TASS/. The plane that was carrying Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of the private military company Wagner, was not subjected to any external impact before it crashed, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club.
"I know, there is probably a question that is begging to be asked about what happened to the company's leadership. We know about the plane crash. The head of the Investigative Committee briefed me just the other day. Fragments of hand grenades were found in the bodies of those killed in the crash. There was no external impact on the plane, and this is an established fact, the result of an examination that was conducted by the Russian Investigative Committee," Putin said.
He went on to say that the dead bodies were not tested for alcohol and drugs, although such tests should have been carried out.
"The investigation is ongoing, but, regrettably, no tests were carried out to determine whether alcohol or drugs were present in the blood of the deceased. However, we all know that after the events that you are well aware of, the FSB [Federal Security Service] found five kilograms of cocaine in the company’s office in St. Petersburg, along with ten billion rubles," he said.
"In my opinion, a test of this kind should have been carried out, but it wasn’t," the Russian president added.
"That’s all I can say," he continued. "I asked the chairman of the Investigative Committee if I can say this publicly, and he replied: ‘Yes, you can, it’s a proven fact.’".