Russian oil executive found dead outside his window, state media says – National

Andrei Badalov, the vice-president of Russia‘s national oil pipeline, Transneft, has been found dead after allegedly falling out of a window of his home in suburban Moscow, law enforcement told Russian state media on Friday.

The former businessman’s body was discovered beneath a window of a house in Rublyovka, an upscale residential neighbourhood on the outskirts of the Russian capital, TASS, Russia’s national news agency, says.

The state-run oil conglomerate also confirmed Badalov’s death, without elaborating on the circumstances, but said his work came during a “difficult and stressful period” due to wartime sanctions, according to the independent Russian newspaper, The Moscow Times. Badalov had served as Transneft’s vice-president since 2021.

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TASS says law enforcement officers told the agency that the deceased had left a farewell note and that preliminary findings suggest his cause of death was suicide.

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An investigation into the incident is underway.

This is the latest in a wave of unexplained deaths of high-profile Russian figures since Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine in 2022.

More than a dozen others have also died:

Anatoly Gerashchenko, the former head of a Russian aviation research university, died on the institute’s grounds after reportedly accidentally falling down numerous flights of stairs in late September 2022.
Vladimir Nikolayevich Sungorkin, the editor-in-chief of the major state newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda, died “suddenly” after appearing to suffocate, according to the paper he used to helm.
Ivan Pechorin, an energy executive, died after falling overboard from a speedboat.
Ravil Maganov, chairman of the board of Russia’s largest private oil company, Lukoil, died after falling out of the sixth-storey window of a hospital.
Alexander Subbotin, a former top manager for Lukoil, was found dead in the basement of a shaman’s house after allegedly receiving a hangover treatment involving toad venom.
Sergey Protosenya, a former executive at Novatek, the largest independent natural gas producer in Russia, was found hanged outside a Spanish villa along with the bodies of his wife and 18-year-old daughter. The deaths appeared to be a murder-suicide.
Vladislav Avayev, former vice-president of Gazprombank, Russia’s third-largest bank, was found dead in his Moscow apartment along with the bodies of his wife and 13-year-old daughter. The deaths also appeared to be a murder-suicide.
Vasily Melnikov, owner of Medstom, a company that imports medical equipment into Russia, and his family were all found dead in their luxury apartment in Nizhny Novgorod. Melnikov, his wife, and their 10-year-old and four-year-old sons had been stabbed to death and the murder weapons were found at the crime scene. Investigators again concluded that the deaths were a result of a murder-suicide.
Mikhail Watford, a Ukrainian-born oligarch who made his millions as an oil and gas tycoon, was found hanged in the garage of his home in Surrey, U.K. Watford’s wife and children, who were home at the time, were not harmed. Watford changed his last name from Tolstosheya after moving to the U.K. in the early 2000s.
Alexander Tyulyakov, deputy general director of the treasury department for Gazprom, the largest publicly-listed natural gas company in the world, was found hanged in the garage of his cottage. A note was found with his body leading investigators to conclude that Tyulyakov died by suicide.
Leonid Shulman, a top executive at Gazprom, was found dead in the bathroom of his cottage next to an apparent suicide note in the same neighbourhood where Tyulyakov would die a month later.
Maj. Gen. Vladimir Makarov, a defence official, was found dead in an apparent suicide after having been fired from his job by Putin.
Marina Yankina, head of finance and procurement for the Russian Defence Ministry’s Western Military District, was found dead after apparently falling from the 16th floor of a highrise apartment in St. Petersburg in February 2023.