MOSCOW (AP) – The daughter of a prominent Russian political theorist often referred to as “Putin’s mastermind” has been killed in a car bombing on the outskirts of Moscow, authorities said Sunday.
The Moscow branch of Russia’s Investigative Committee said preliminary information indicated that 29-year-old television commentator Daria Dugina was killed by an explosive device planted in the SUV she was driving on Saturday night.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility. But the bloodshed raised suspicions that her father, Alexander Dugin, a nationalist philosopher and author, was the intended target.
Dugin is a prominent supporter of the concept of the “Russian world”, an intellectual and political ideology that emphasizes traditional values, the restoration of Russia’s power, and the unity of all ethnic Russians around the world. He is also a staunch supporter of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s move to send troops to Ukraine.
The blast occurred as his daughter was returning from a cultural festival she had attended with him. Russian media reported witnesses that the SUV belonged to Dugin and that he decided at the last minute to travel in another vehicle.
The car bombing, unusual for Moscow, is likely to exacerbate tensions between Russia and Ukraine.
Denis Pushilin, president of the separatist Donetsk People’s Republic, the pro-Moscow region at the heart of Russia’s fighting in Ukraine, blamed the explosion on “terrorists of the Ukrainian regime, who tried to kill Alexander Dugin.”
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, denied Ukrainian involvement, saying: “We are not a criminal state, unlike Russia, and certainly not a terrorist state.”
Political analyst Abbas Gallyamov, a former Putin speechwriter, called the attack an “act of intimidation” aimed at Kremlin loyalists.
For them, he said, “this is a symbolic act, showing that the hostilities have been confidently transferred to the territory of Russia, which means that this is no longer an abstract war that you watch on TV,” he said. “This is already happening in Russia. Not only is Crimea being bombed, but terrorist attacks are already taking place in the Moscow region.”
While Dugin’s exact ties to Putin are unclear, the Kremlin often echoes rhetoric from his writings and appearances on Russian state television. He helped popularize the concept of “Novorossiya” or “New Russia” that Russia used to justify its 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea and its support for separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine.
It promotes Russia as a country of piety, traditional values and authoritarian leadership and despises Western liberal values.
His daughter expressed similar views and had appeared as a commentator on the nationalist Tsargrad TV channel, where Dugin had served as editor-in-chief.
Dugina herself was sanctioned by the United States in March for her work as editor-in-chief of United World International, a website the US described as a source of disinformation. The sanctions announcement cited a United Nations article this year that argued Ukraine would “disappear” if it were admitted to NATO.
In an appearance on Russian television just Thursday, Dugina said: “People in the West are living in a dream, a dream given to them by world hegemony.” He called America a “zombie society” in which people opposed Russia but couldn’t find it on a map.
Dugina, “like her father, has always been at the forefront of the confrontation with the West,” Tsargrad said on Sunday.
An unidentified Russian group, the National Republican Army, claimed responsibility for the bombing, according to a former Russian lawmaker, Ilya Ponomarev. The AP was unable to verify the existence of the group. Ponomarev, who fled Russia after voting against the annexation of Crimea in 2014, made the statement on Ukrainian television.