A plot to assassinate Vladimir Putin on a Moscow bridge was reportedly '"foiled by Russian Secret Service".
The assassination attempt reportedly involved laying explosives laid on a river bed below a bridge that the Russian autocrat's motorcade would have travelled over.
The Federal Protection Service (FSO), responsible for the protection of top Russian officials, claims it bettered a bid to blow up the bridge, according to the Telegram channel VChK-OGPU.
A barge has been suspected of laying explosives under an unnamed bridge prior to the assassination attempt.
Just yesterday, the warmonger was at the Strong Ideas for New Time by the Russian Agency of Strategic Initiative at the World Trade Centre and videos have since emerged of security services close to the Novoarbatsky Bridge scouring the water.
According to the post on VChK-OGPU: “The FSO was checking information about the preparation of an assassination attempt on Putin with the help of explosives at the bottom of the Moskva River, laid down from a barge.
“A duty officer of the Federal Security Service reported a suspicious barge under the bridge.”
Reports claim divers were seen entering the water after the suspect barge was told to move, “due to the movement of motorcades over the bridge”, reports the Daily Star.
The FSO is also understood to have checked the papers of the crew of the barge, which in turn said it was carrying out repairs to the bridge.
The activity has, however, been portrayed as a response to efforts to “assassinate Putin”.
This announcement comes amid the ongoing Ukrainian counter-offensive in the neighbouring country, and in the wake of what appears to be a failed attempt at a coup by the Wagner mercenary group.
It comes as an increasingly paranoid Putin has stepped up his personal security amid fears after last week’s uprising in Russia.
Wagner Group boss Yevgeny Prigozhin, who led the abandoned rebellion, is said to be a “dead man walking” after going into exile in Belarus.
Some of Putin’s defence officials who may be suspected of being too close to the mercenary leader could also soon be “disappeared”, sources claim.
A number of senior Wagner Group executives and a handful of oligarchs have also been earmarked for the Russian president’s hit squads, it is believed.
A western security source told the Mirror: “There is an increasing belief that Prigozhin will be gone in months, if not sooner, and many others as well.