A prominent scientist who helped expand Russia’s COVID vaccine, Sputnik V, died Thursday in his Moscow apartment, according to the Russian Federation’s investigative committee.
Andrey Botikov, who worked as a senior researcher at the National Research Center for Ecology and Mathematics in Gamaleya, was found dead in his apartment on Thursday. His death is being investigated as murder, the committee said in a Telegram statement.
“According to the investigation, on March 2, 2023, in a construction on Moscow’s Rogova Street, a 29-year-old man, during an argument, strangled the 47-year-old apartment owner with a belt and fled the scene. scene,” the committee said on a Friday.
A suspect arrested shortly after Botikov’s frame was found, the federal investigative firm said in the statement. “As soon as possible, the location of the culprit was established. During the interrogation, he admitted his guilt, charged. for committing a felony.
Russian media know the suspect as “Alexei Z,” an ex-convict who spent 10 years in prison for offering sexual services. Local media, adding to Russian outlet Mash, said the incident appeared to be the result of a currency dispute between the scientists and the suspect.
“The body of the 48-year-old man has been Array. . . with strangulation marks, several stab wounds and abrasions on his body,” Mash reported.
Botikov, one of 18 scientists who developed the Sputnik V vaccine in 2020. According to the Moscow Times, Russian President Vladimir Putin revered the virologist with the Order of Merit of the Fatherland Award for his paintings on the COVID vaccine in 2021.
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