The governor of Sverdlovsk Region has been seriously injured in a road accident. The circumstances surrounding the accident are unclear.
The official, Aleksandr Misharin, is now in an induced coma following an operation.
The accident, involving three cars, happened on the motorway connecting the cities of Ekaterinburg and Serov.
The driver of one car was killed. Traffic police suspect he may have been responsible for the crash. Another theory is that the accident was caused by bad weather as the roads were quite icy.
However, some witnesses say it was the governor’s chauffeur-driven car that violated the road rules.
The accident has attracted a lot of public attention in the light of the recent high-profile case involving a Lukoil official. Back in February, a Mercedes carrying Lukoil vice-president Anatoly Barkov crashed head-on with a Citroen. The driver and the passenger of the Citroen, Olga Aleksandrina and her mother-in-law, Vera Sidelnikova, died.
The police closed the case after concluding the woman driver who was killed in the accident was responsible. A car-owners’ group has accused Moscow authorities of bias and of tampering with the evidence.