19:22, August 28, 2023Source: Fontanka.ru

Metal detector frames were installed in front of the central gate of the Serafimovsky cemetery in St. Petersburg. 

As Fontanka writes on the evening of August 28, this may be due to preparations for the funeral of Yevgeny Prigozhin, who died in a plane crash.

The publication notes that it is not yet clear which of the passengers of the business jet will be buried at the Serafimovsky cemetery, but claims that it will be at least five people. 

The director of the cemetery said that the city administration sets the framework and that he does not know whether Prigozhin or other passengers of the plane will be buried there. “

[Presidential press secretary Dmitry] Peskov doesn’t even know, and you ask me,” he said.

The Serafimovsky cemetery contains the graves of many honored soldiers and officers of the Ministry of Defense, as well as the graves of the parents of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

At the moment, there is no official information about where and when Prigozhin will be buried. Fontanka claims that “as of August 28” it is only clear that the businessman himself, as well as the commander of the Wagner PMC, Dmitry Utkin, and the top manager of Prigozhin’s structures, Valery Chekalov, will be buried in St. Petersburg. 

In the afternoon, the publication wrote that it was originally planned to bury them at the Serafimovsky cemetery with honors, but then the option of separate burials began to be considered: Prigozhin, in particular, was supposed to be buried at the Northern Cemetery. 

The same information was published by the VChK-OGPU telegram channel with reference to sources.

Fontanka notes that the Bogoslovskoye, Severnoye and Smolenskoye cemeteries are indeed also preparing for a possible ceremony, but there “were not noticed as many obvious preparations as at Serafimovsky”. 

At the same time, at the Smolensk cemetery, in response to a question from Paper, they expressed surprise that the funeral was not planned in Moscow. 

Representatives of the Theological Cemetery told the publication that they had not received any documents addressed to Yevgeny Prigozhin.

The Union of Funeral Organizations, in turn, assures that none of the St. Petersburg cemeteries is preparing for the funeral.On the afternoon of August 28, Fontanka wrote that the leadership of the city police was “concerned about safety, blocking streets and order during the inevitable funeral ceremony for the dead.” 

The Ministry of Internal Affairs is ready to give additional outfits and operatives to the cemetery, however, according to Fontanka, the security service of Prigozhin’s Concord company does not make contact with the security forces, referring to “secret” teams from Moscow.The funeral can presumably take place as early as August 29, according to Fontanka. 

At the same time, in its daily material, the publication emphasized : “When something concerns the name of Prigozhin, everything changes rapidly.”

(C)MEDUZA 2023