The daughter of prominent Kremlin-connected far-right ideologue Aleksandr Dugin, a vocal supporter of and propagandist for Russia's invasion of Ukraine, was killed when the car she was traveling in exploded in the Moscow region on August 20, Russian investigators said.
An explosive device was likely planted in the car belonging to 30-year-old Darya Dugina, Russia's Investigative Committee said in a statement, describing Dugina as "a journalist and political analyst."
"According to investigators, on August 20 around 21:00 in the Odintsovo urban district near the village of Bolshiye Vyazemy, an explosive device, presumably installed in the Toyota Land Cruiser [vehicle], went off on a public road and then the car caught fire. The female driver died at the scene. We established the identity of the deceased as journalist and political analyst [Darya] Dugina," the department said in a message on its Telegram channel.
Video footage that accompanied the committee's statement showed investigators collecting debris from the site of the blast.
Investigators said they had opened a murder case and would be carrying out forensic examinations to try to determine exactly what happened.
According to family members and quoted by the Russian media Dugin and his daughter had been attending a festival outside Moscow and he had decided to switch cars at the last minute.
Denis Pushilin, a Moscow-backed separatist leader in Ukraine's Donetsk region, also said Dugin was the intended target of the blast, which he blamed on Kyiv.
"The Ukrainian regime terrorists tried to liquidate Aleksandr Dugin, but blew up his daughter," Pushilin wrote on Telegram without providing evidence to back his claim.
Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak denied that Kyiv was behind Dugina's death.
"Ukraine, of course, has nothing to do with the explosion because we are not a criminal state -- like the Russian Federation -- and certainly not a terrorist state," he said during an appearance on television on August 21, according to the news outlet Ukrainska Pravda.
Political analyst Abbas Gallyamov, a former speechwriter for Russian President Vladimir Putin, called the attack “an act of intimidation” aimed at Kremlin loyalists.
Investigators said they were considering "all versions."
Dugin is a far-right Russian author and ideologue described as being the architect or "spiritual guide" of Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine."
He has long called for the absorption of Ukraine into Russia.
Dugin is one of the main ideologues of Russia's Neo-Eurasianist movement, which has been described by political scientists as fascist. It promotes an extreme right-wing view of Russia’s place on the international stage that some have said resembles Nazism.
Putin has sometimes echoed Dugin's expansionist language and views, and while the extent of his influence on the Kremlin is unclear, the ideologue is sometimes described as "Putin's Brain."
Both father and daughter have loudly backed the war against Ukraine.
Dugin was put on a Western sanctions list after Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, a move he also backed.
Dugina was a political commentator for the International Eurasian Movement, which is led by her father.
In March, the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned Dugina for "acting or purporting to act for or on behalf" of the United World International (UWI) website, of which she was the chief editor. The treasury said Dugina also contributed to a UWI article suggesting that Ukraine would "perish" if it is admitted to NATO.