The attempts by Russia’s FSB security services to link the death of Dugina—daughter of Alexander Dugin, an influential ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin—to Estonia are a “provocation,” Urmas Reinsalu, Estonia’s foreign minister, told local TV.
Dugina was killed in a car bombing on the outskirts of Moscow on Saturday. On Monday, the FSB, after a brief investigation, claimed that a female Ukrainian citizen was involved in Dugina’s killing and fled to Estonia on Sunday.
“We regard this as one instance of provocation in a very long line of provocations by the Russian Federation, and we have nothing more to say about it at the moment,” Reinsalu told local TV station ERR.
On August 16, Estonia removed a Soviet-era tank memorial from the Russian-speaking town of Narva, near to its border with Russia. The country was subsequently hit with its biggest cyber attack in 15 years.
Russian hacker group Killnet claimed responsibility for the attack. In a statement on its Telegram account on August 17, the group said it had blocked access to more than 200 state and private Estonian institutions.
This chart, provided by Statista, shows governments committing the most bilateral aid to Ukraine as a percentage share of their own GDP.
Reinsalu suggested Russia was pressuring the country for supporting Ukraine in its ongoing war.
“Why did Estonia experience the biggest cyber attacks since the Bronze Soldier night? Why did the former president of Russia say two weeks ago that it was their failure that Estonia is still a free country?” he asked.
“I think all these events and various actions are placed in a wider context and the purpose of this is to exert unequivocal pressure by various methods to Estonia and a number of other countries that support Ukraine,” Reinsalu said.
The FSB claimed on Monday that Dugina’s killing was “prepared and committed by Ukrainian special services.” It accused a Ukrainian woman, supposedly born in 1979, of being involved in Dugina’s death.
The FSB’s statement alleged that the Ukrainian citizen arrived in Russia on July 23 together with her daughter, and rented an apartment in the same building as Dugina.
“On the day of the murder,” the Ukrainian citizen and her daughter “attended the literary and music festival Tradition, where Dugina was present as an honorary guest.”
The Ukrainian citizen subsequently left Russia through the Pskov region to Estonia after the car explosion, the FSB said.
Ukraine has denied any involvement in Dugina’s death.
Newsweek has contacted the foreign ministries of Estonia and Russia for comment.