8th Suspicious Death of Russian Diplomat or Official in 5 months: Denis Voronenkov

Update: CNN has added the deaths of three more Russian diplomats or officials in two months to the list. CNN has noticed what we noticed 2 months ago: The mysterious deaths of Russian officials are piling up.

First Alexander Kadakin, 67, the Russian ambassador to India, died on January 26 after a brief, mysterious illness. Then, Denis Voronenkov was gunned down in Ukraine.

"The brazen daytime slaying of a Russian politician outside a Ukrainian hotel this week brings to eight the number of high-profile Russians who have died over the past five months since the US presidential election on November 8," says CNN. http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/24/europe/dead-russians/index.html

Denis Voronenkov, 45, was gunned down Thursday outside a hotel in Kiev. Voronenkov and his wife both spoke out against Putin after they left Russia for Ukraine in October.

For noticing the similarities in deaths that were piling up 2 month's ago, the Kremlin added us to their official "Fake News" list. http://money.cnn.com/2017/02/22/media/russia-government-fake-news/ Now, they'll have to add CNN as well.

You read it here first! Here's our story from January:

For the fifth time in 3 months, a Russian diplomat has died under suspicious circumstances. Vitaly Churkin death at Russia's consulate in New York City has been explained as a mere "heart attack." But his death involved a mysterious femme fatale, sources say.

Russia's UN Ambassador reportedly shared the intimate company of a much younger woman before he showed up dead at the Russian Consulate in New York City on Monday morning. The official line was that he suffered a heart attack at the Consulate, and was rushed to NYC's Presbyterian hospital. He was transported to the Russian Consulate already dead, sources say, from a more compromising location.

Conspiracists on Twitter theorize that a woman seen cavorting with Churkin recently was not, in fact, merely a mistress, but an intelligence agent. Is there a campaign underway to kill Russian diplomats? It seems so. Other Russian diplomats and spies who have died recently include:

1. Oleg Erovinkin was an FSB officer linked to the infamous "golden shower" Trump dossier. On December 26, 2016, Erovinkin was found dead in his car in Moscow. No cause of death has been announced.

2. On December 19, 2016, while speaking at an art gallery exhibition in Ankara, Russian ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov was assassinated by Mevlüt Mert Altıntaş, an off-duty Turkish policeman.

3. Petr Polshikov, 56, was said to be a high ranking Russian diplomat in the Latin American department. He was found dead from multiple bullet wounds on December 18, 2016 in Moscow. His murder remains unsolved. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2445028/petr-polshikov-russian-diplomat-shot-dead/

4. Andrey Malanin, 54 a high ranking Russian diplomat was found dead in his apartment in Athens Greece on January 9, 2017 with no signs of a break in and no apparent cause. http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/top-russian-diplomat-found-dead-9593229

Not only Russian officers have become victims of this campaign. Within 24 hours of the deaths of Polshikov and Karlov, Yves Chandelon, the chief auditor of NATO relating to terrorism financing and money laundering, was found dead in his car of a gunshot wound. Chandelon had been made to look like a suicide, but the circumstances were suspicious.

Some on Twitter expressed doubt that the timing of the diplomat's death was a mere coincidence. "As investigation in to Trump Russian ties build up suddenly Vitaly Churkin dies. What a coincidence. #Russiagate, #kremlingate #flynn" tweeted one. "Vitaly Churkin dies suddenly! Putin is possibly erasing all links to Donald Trump and Russia's connection to him. Other Intel agents died," said another, referring to Sergei Krivov.

Krivov, another Russian diplomat in the US, died under suspicious circumstances the day after the US election. Like Churkin, he died at the Russian Consulate in New York City, and was said to have suffered a heart attack there. But this did not explain blunt force trauma to Krivov's head. https://www.buzzfeed.com/alimwatkins/the-strange-case-of-the-russian-diplomat-who-got-his-head-sm?utm_term=.gvVX5xwx5#.onKAL2N2L

President Vladimir Putin, who expressed deep personal shock at the death of the longtime diplomat and friend, also prefers the company of young women. The president dated Russian Olympic gymnast Alina Kabaeva, and is reputed to have had a child with her in 2015.

In so dying, the Diplomat and former child actor joins the ranks for former United States Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, who died in 1979 at age 70 in the company of a 25 year old aide, Megan Marshack. Finding Rockefeller dead, Marshack called a friend before she called an ambulance. She refused to speak about the incident for the rest of her life.

It is not clear whether the longtime Russian diplomat was still married at the time of his death, so the pair may have simply been consenting adults. Churkin had 2 adult children from his marriage. The identity of Churkin's mistress or girlfriend was not immediately available.

For the record the official account is as follows: Vitaly Churkin fell ill at his office at the Russian Mission to the U.N. on East 67th Street around 9:30 a.m. and was unconscious when emergency personnel arrived, sources said.

Churkin was given CPR and taken to New York Presbyterian Hospital in serious condition. He was pronounced dead at 10:55 a.m., the day before his 65th birthday.

Update: 2/23, the Kremlin has labelled this story as "Fake News." http://www.mid.ru/en/nedostovernie-publikacii

This story has been used as a reference by the New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/22/world/europe/russia-fake-news-media-foreign-ministry-.html