A strategy against foreign spies
It sounds unbelievable but apparently, according to a report from two investigative journalists and also explained in another article, when visiting other countries, President Vladimir Putin’s bodyguards collect his poop.
In an article published for the French news magazine Paris Match, Regis Gente, the author of two books on Russia, and Mikhail Rubin, a 13-year veteran of the country’s press, confessed.
The request seems to come from the Federal Protection Service, the division in charge of guarding Putin and other government officials for security reasons.
Gente and Rubin claim that every time Putin needs to use the restroom, an FSO agent puts his waste in a specific packet so it can be sent back to Russia in a suitcase. The procedure already took place when Putin visited France on May 29, 2017, and when he visited Saudi Arabia in October 2019.
In a video, six suit-clad members of Putin’s entourage were seen escorting him into a restroom during a 2019 trip to France. One of them was observed carrying a little briefcase out of the restroom, but it’s unknown what was inside.
The strategy appears to be an attempt to lessen the possibility of outside parties learning details about Putin’s health or propensity for future illnesses that could be found in his DNA.
By claiming on Twitter to be aware of a similar event in Vienna and citing a second source who claimed Putin’s bodyguards have been engaging in the practice for years, the journalist Farida Rustamova appeared to support the report.
Because Putin has recently missed numerous important events, there is growing concern that he is ill. According to several sources, Putin is being treated for several serious diseases. However, some experts questioned the stories, pointing out that there hasn’t been any solid proof that Putin is ill yet.
In addition, there are other instances of excrement interception being employed as an intelligence procedure.
During the Jordanian King Hussein’s funeral in Amman in 1999, Israeli Mossad agents pulled out a similar ruse. President Hafez al-Assad of Syria was ill with cancer and diabetes at the time, and in order to get further information regarding Assad’s health, the Mossad transported his poop from his hotel room to a special collection device in collaboration with their Jordanian counterparts.
It’s also thought that both the poop of Ugandan dictator Yoweri Museveni and the former Russian leader Mikhail Gorbachev was collected by the CIA while they were in Washington. George W. Bush reportedly sent his own toilet to Vienna, Austria, before a state visit in 2006 in order to protect the contents of his waste.
In 2016, a former Soviet agent claimed to have found proof that Joseph Stalin attempted to spy on Chairman Mao of China and other officials by examining their feces.
According to Tony Geraghty, a British military specialist, British spies searched through dirty toilet paper used by Soviet troops in East Germany during the Cold War. He explained that this was because the Soviets were not provided with toilet paper and frequently had to use personal letters or military documents in its place.
According to Reuters, French President Emmanuel Macron declined a request from the Kremlin to take a Russian COVID-19 test in advance of a face-to-face meeting with Putin out of concern that the results could be used to study Putin’s DNA.
However, a lot of poo professors warn that there is still insufficient data that limits this science. Even though today’s sophisticated tests can provide scientists with information about a person’s unique health problems and lifestyle, they are currently unable to be employed to correctly forecast disease without additional clinical data.
