Russian President Vladimir Putin took a highly-publicized trip to the Russia-occupied city of Mariupol on Sunday – just three days after the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for his arrest – where he toured the city, met rehoused residents and was briefed on reconstruction efforts by Mariupol’s Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin.
Shortly after he was spotted in Mariupol, however, Anton Gerashechenko, an adviser to the minister of internal affairs of Ukraine, accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of sending a body double in his place during his March 19 visit to Mariupol.
“Which one do you think is the real one?” asked Gerashechenko on Twitter with three side-by-side images of Putin allegedly taken between February 21st and March 19th.
Which one do you think is the real one? pic.twitter.com/SV8TVdnUQE
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) March 20, 2023
Does Putin use a body double?
Conspiracy theories regarding Putin’s use of body doubles have persisted for years. Ukrainian military intelligence chief Major General Kyrylo Budanov suggested in August 2022 that Putin’s ears looked different across several of the leader’s public appearances.
“Russian President Vladimir Putin uses at least three look-alikes. They have had plastic surgery to look more like the Kremlin head,” Budanov told The Kyiv Post earlier this year, explaining that using body doubles reduces the risk of an assassination attempt.
Putin has previously been accused of using body doubles on state visits, such as an early-2000s trip to Chechnya and now a visit to Mariupol. Putin has also been accused of employing body doubles to quell rumors about his health.
“We know specifically about three people who keep appearing, but how many there are, we don’t know,” Budanov said.
“We know specifically about three people who keep appearing, but how many there are, we don’t know,”
-Major General Kyrylo Budanov, Ukraine's military intelligence chief
Putin has publicly acknowledged that he has at the very least been offered a body double. During an interview with the TASS state-owned news agency in 2020, Putin said that he "discarded the idea of any doubles" during the early 2000s as Russia was engaged in the second Chechen war.
Putin is not the first Russian leader to be known for his employment of body doubles – former Soviet leader Joseph Stalin had two known body doubles during his reign. One body double, known only as Rashid, was recruited by a KGB agent to attend meetings as Joseph Stalin, though there is another supposed body double known as Felix Dadaev.