Russian businessman appears on TV as bodyguards glower in background, to claim he is in line to be killed

'Nikolai Glushkov was the first one to be assassinated', claims Sergei Kapchuk who appears on embassy list of alleged fugitives from justice

A Russian businessman has appeared on television apparently flanked by bodyguards and claimed he fears for his safety following the assassination attempt on Sergei Skripal.

Sergei Kapchuk, a former regional deputy in Sverdlovsk, claimed he was in line to be killed, as two men in dark suits and sunglasses glowered in the background.

Mr Kapchuk appears on a Russian embassy list of people wanted for alleged crimes in Russia and he suggested that others – unnamed UK media agencies – considered it a “death row list”.

In an interview with the TV Rain channel, he referenced the death of Nikolai Glushkov in New Malden, south-west London. Police are treating the death of Mr Glushkov, an associate of leading Vladimir Putin critic Boris Berezovsky, as unexplained.

“Nikolai Glushkov was the first one to be assassinated and I will be the 12th, sorry 11th now. I am not happy about it”, Mr Kapchuk said.

Mr Kapchuk goes by the name Windsor in the UK, according to news reports from 2017, and his Facebook profile lists him as director general of Royal Apartments, a short-let company based in Chelsea.

On Companies House he is listed as the director of three more firms based at the same address plus one in Kensington.

Last year, the Russian embassy in London published the names of 22 people it said were fugitives from justice in their home country.

Mr Kapchuk was charged with “large-scale fraud in collusion through abuse of power” under Article 159 of Russia’s criminal code, it said. Mr Glushkov also appeared on the list, charged with embezzlement.

But Mr Kapchuck told TV Rain his “personal file” had been deleted from Interpol’s database and that “furthermore my data files were deleted from all ‘criminal wanted’ lists from all over the world”.

There was no evidence he had committed wrongdoing, he said, but added the Russian embassy had declined to remove him from the list.