Mystery surrounds the death of a 28-year-old bank executive in Russia who plunged from her apartment window.

Kristina Baikova, a vice-president at Loko-Bank, allegedly fell from her 11th floor apartment in Moscow in the early hours of last Friday. She died instantly.

It’s the latest mysterious fatality involving some of Russia’s top business and government figures.

Ms Baikova was with her 34-year-old friend, thought to be called Andrei, who she had invited over for a drink.

An investigation into her death has been launched. 

Other suspicious deaths since the start of Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine include that of Russian defence official Marina Yankina, 58, in February this year. Like Ms Baikova, she fell to her death from an apartment window.

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As head of the financial support department of the Ministry of Defence, Ms Yankina was a key figure in the funding of the war.

Her death was reported as a suspected suicide – although this is common in Russia before any investigation is carried out or when facts are unclear.

In May meanwhile, Russia’s deputy science minister, Pyotr Kucherenko, thought to be a critic of the war, died suddenly after falling ill on a flight back to Moscow after a work trip in Cuba, the Mail Online reports.

The family said the 46-year-old’s death was linked to a heart condition, but independent journalist Roman Super wrote after his death that his ‘old friend’ had spoken in private about his inability to escape Russia.

In April, Igor Shkurko, the deputy general director of Russian energy company Yakutskenergo, was found dead in his prison cell.

The 49-year-old was a member of the pro-Putin United Russia political party but his membership was suspended following the bribe accusation.

Two months earlier, Russian oil boss Viatcheslav Rovneiko, 59, was ‘found unconscious’ late at night at his home.

Doctors were unable to save him, a report in Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper claimed.

On December 26, Pavel Antonov – a wealthy sausage tycoon, local politician and a Putin critic – died in India after falling out of a hotel window.

His friend Vladimir Bidenov was found dead in the same hotel four days earlier.

These are just a few of the recent deaths of leading Russian figures shrouded in mystery.

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