Uh... so Arkady Babchenko, the Russian dissident reporter who was murdered yesterday, is... not dead. Ukrainian secret services just paraded him before the cameras on life TV. It was a setup. Dear God
Bet you didn't see this late-season finale twist in year 4 of the Russia-Ukraine war. Apparently the whole thing was staged so that they could catch the people who ordered the hit. And it is normal because "Sherlock Holmes" did it
Here is Babchenko, surrounded by Ukrainian security officials and smirking at the thought of the punch in the face @barabanch, who just wrote a lovely obituary for him, will give him imminently 
I can't decide if this is the most brilliant or spectacularly moronic thing I've ever heard. I think it's both. Up there with the guy in Guatemala who set up his own murder to make it look like someone else had done it
Turns out not even Babchenko's own wife - to say nothing of his six adopted children - knew about it. "Olechka, I am sorry, but there were no options here," Babchenko says. "I'm sorry for making you live through this. I've buried my own friends and colleagues many times myself."
From the sounds of it Ukraine has made much more effort to set up the fake Babchenko murder rather than to catch the very real murderers of fellow reporter Pavel Sheremet, or even interrogate suspects with ties to Ukrainian secret services 🤔
The only thing I can think of even remotely similar to this is the time that Vince McMahon staged his own car-bombing on WWF - Donald Trump thought it was real and asked Triple H if Vince was OK
Babchenko and Ukraine have given the Kremlin infinite ammunition to say "I know you are, but what am I?" every time someone accuses them of lying over MH17, Ukraine, Skripal, etc
Christ alive, they even set up a memorial plaque for him and now they have to take it down
Might I remind you that Ukraine's prime minister accused the Kremlin of carrying out a targeted assassination of a Russian dissident on its soil this morning and... now they think it was all a cool prank
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This is the dumbest televised prank I have seen since Rio's World Cup Wind-Ups. Congratulations, Ukraine! You got Merk'd! By yourselves!
