Moment Putin is 'called his body double’s name’ by Russian chief live on camera

After a Russian official seemingly accidentally confirmed Vladimir Putin's body double is a real person, a little digging has turned this conspiracy theory into a frenzy online.

It has long been suggested that Putin, a former KGB agent and topless horse rider, has been using another person to stand-in for him at certain events.

However, the evidence has been a little lax thus far.

Mostly, people believe that Putin’s doubles (yes, plural) all get surgery to look like the ‘original’, including earlobes, nose, neck, and whatever else, and they also mimic his body language.

This is to make sure that they pass as the OG (Putin) during official events.

While this has been hailed as nothing more than online tosh, a recent slip-up has added fuel to the fire.

It stemmed from Nexta publishing footage of a meeting between Putin and a Russian official, who seemed to address the leader as 'Pal Laich', which was suggested to be a shortened version of 'Pavel Nikolaevich'.

“Pal Laich, thank you very much. I have prepared a presentation,” deputy prime minister Dmitry Patrushev said in the footage.

The Kremlin’s official transcript even corrected Patrushev’s slip-up to his other known name, ‘Vladimir Vladimirovich’ for readers.

Online, commenters were quick to call out the mistake, with one user writing on X: "Pal Laich? Even Kremlin insiders are mixing up the script now. Body double theory just got another plot twist."

Another said: "Is that putin or his body double?"

However, not everyone was on board, with one writing: "That’s definitely not a body double, no idea about the name though."

Obviously, Vladimir Putin and 'Vladimir Vladimirovich', do not sound like the above – sparking the theories that the chief mistakenly called ‘Putin’ the body double’s name.

Now, the 73-year-old's ‘Pai Laich’ mystery has caused the body-double theory to be looked into again.

Previously, Kyrylo Budanov, the former head of Ukrainian military intelligence, alleged in 2022 that Putin often uses lookalikes.

“There are at least three people [body doubles] who periodically appear,” Budanov said.

Then, former UK intelligence chief Sir Richard Dearlove corroborated this theory, by telling The Sun that he is 'certain' Putin uses body doubles on public occasions to reduce the risk of him being assassinated.

He said: “It’s almost a normal security measure for somebody like Putin – who is a very high-profile target.

“Bear in mind that assassination has been a pretty common part of Russian politics for many, many years.”