Mourning for Vladimir Putin’s uncompromising defense minister as his paratrooper nephew is killed

The commander of the paratroopers, Captain Adam Khamkhoyev, is the first relative of a senior official of Vladimir Putin, who died during the invasion of Ukraine

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Ukraine: funeral of injured Russian captain Adam Khamchoyev

The nephew of Russia’s hard-line deputy defense minister was killed by Ukrainian forces in the war.

Captain Adam Khamkhoyev, 30, a paratrooper commander, was killed in Ukraine on Friday night and later buried in southern Russia’s Ingushetia province.

His uncle is Colonel-General Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, Russia’s hard-line deputy defense minister, who is a pro-war minister in the administration of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Captain Chamkhoyev’s death marks the first time a senior Putin official has suffered the loss of a close relative in his war in Ukraine.

Colonel Yevkurov flew to Karabulak to attend his nephew’s funeral.

The Baza news agency reported that he “expressed his condolences, spoke to the elders and the religious part of the community, and then flew back to Moscow.”

Khamkhoev was a graduate of the Elite Ryazan Airborne Forces School and commander of a Russian airborne assault squadron.

His uncle Yevkurov was a distinguished paratrooper who once received the honor of Hero of Russia, the country’s highest award.

No details of his death have been released from either Russia or Ukraine.

The news comes as 21-year-old Russian soldier Sergeant Vadim Shishimarin has been sentenced to life in prison after being convicted of murdering a 62-year-old civilian in the first war crimes trial since the invasion of Ukraine.

Putin is grappling with sustained casualties as Britain’s Defense Ministry said Russia is likely to have suffered similar casualty numbers in the three months of the war in Ukraine as the Soviet Union suffered during a nine-year conflict in Afghanistan.

Yevkurov is a former governor and now one of the deputies of close Putin ally Sergei Shoigu, Russia’s defense minister.

He was the subject of an assassination attempt in 2009.

In March, he was seen in a harrowing clip visiting a bedridden soldier in hospital.

The soldier had lost a leg and looked wide-eyed and frightened as Yevkurov said to him, “I hope you get back on your feet.”

A New York Times report states that the United States has provided intelligence on Russian units that have enabled Ukrainians to attack and kill Putin’s generals, with the attrition rate now standing at about one colonel every two days.

Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the US would “provide information and intelligence to Ukraine to help it defend itself.”

However, Adrienne Watson, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said the intelligence services were not “deployed with the intention of killing Russian generals”.

Ukrainian officials said they killed about 12 generals at the front.