Vladimir Putin slammed as 'scum' by fellow Russian elites in leaked recording

A recording of a conversation between two Russian elites has been leaked in which they don’t hold back in their criticism of President Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin.

Vladimir Putin is 'satan'

The discussion was allegedly between Russian music producer Iosif Prigozhin and Azerbaijani-born former politician and billionaire Farkhad Akhmedov. In the clip, Akhmedov allegedly said of Putin, according to Ukrainian media outlet Ukrainska Pravda:

He is Satan. Totally vacuous.

The expletive-ridden clip was also shared on Twitter by the account War Translated with subtitles translated into English. In it, Prigozhin describes the Kremlin leadership as:

Absolute f**king scum. I can’t say anything good about them. They’re scumbags.

Akhmedov says:

They f**king blew the situation, f**king blew the country. Blew everything.

Now it’s a difficult situation, they all demonstrated that they’re all useless, incapable, not smart, not sensible, not qualified.

He’s [Putin] responsible for everything… President will answer for all this… They’ll ask from him.

They f**king us up, our children, their future, their fate, you see?

To which Prigozhin replied:

To be honest, they are of course f**king criminals, and proper f**king criminals at that.

He [Putin] gave away the country, gave it the f**k away. And we've got nowhere to go.

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Kremlin leadership 'spilled the blood of innocent people'

Akhmedov then describes the Kremlin leadership as 'cockroaches' and agrees with Prigozhin’s earlier assessment, saying:

They f**king fooled everyone, damn it. F**king scumbags. And spilling the blood of innocent people.

Prigozhin states 'he’s (Putin) a nobody', to which Akhmedov agrees again, saying:

A nobody… Insecure both of them [Putin and Medvedev]. F**king m**gets. Undersized, insecure… Everyone hates them.

Finally, Prigozhin declares 'he [Putin] practically buried all Russian people'.

Newsweek has been unable to independently verify the clip's authenticity, nor the speakers' identities. In a video posted to Telegram, Prigozhin described the recording as 'fake'.

However, the music producer then claimed he did 'not remember this conversation exactly' and 'in any case, such actions are an attack on privacy'. Prigozhin added that 'we all have private conversations in which some doubts can be expressed'.

Sources used:

Newsweek: 'Russian Billionaire Slams Putin in Leaked Audio: 'He Is Satan''