[1]
By John Helmer, Moscow
@bears_with [2]
In Russian, the verb ушёл is in the perfective past tense, masculine, of the infinitive уйти, meaning “to leave”. Its synonyms include depart, quit, walk away, retire, resign, withdraw.
A train which is reported to have left the station continues on its journey. It has not crashed off the track.
In the common figure of speech, the expression ушёл из жизни is used to mean, literally, “he departed from life”. It’s a euphemism for “he died”. More than softening the fact of death, in Russian religious tradition it means that the death was not the end but the transition to the after-life.
What the phrase cannot mean in Russian is that the individual was ambushed, bombed, murdered. ушёл из жизни can never describe an assassination – unless the phrase is intended by its user to cover up the circumstances of the killing and the identity of the killer.
So what was President Vladimir Putin meaning when he told [3] Russian reporters at the Kremlin on Saturday evening that Ali Larijani, executive head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, had “passed away” (ушёл из жизни).
Putin was replying to a reporter who asked him to comment on the options in negotiation with Iran at the moment over safeguards for its highly enriched uranium. “Russia once offered its own export platform, the United States of America refuses. The Iranians say they want to keep the [uranium] too. Do you see a way out of this situation?”
“Everyone agreed –” Putin replied, “the representatives of the United States agreed, Iran agreed, Israel agreed. But then the United States hardened its position and demanded export only to the United States. After that, Iran hardened its position, I was told, and then along came Mr. Larijani, who unfortunately has passed away. That’s a pity, he was a person with whom it was possible to conduct a constructive dialogue, he was able to listen, hear, respond to everything. But then he came and said, ‘No, you know, we’ve changed our position too. Now we are not ready to take out this enriched uranium anywhere. We offer Russia a new format of cooperation – to create a joint venture, but on the territory of Iran, and together there to dilute uranium.’ I said, ‘I don’t mind. The main thing is that this should defuse the situation. But it seems to me that no one will agree with this: neither the United States nor Israel. This has happened, and in this direction the situation has reached a standstill, frankly.’” http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/79718 [3]
In the Kremlin record Putin has met Larijani [4] four times – November 11, 2006; October 22, 2015; July 20, 2025; and most recently on January 30, 2026 [5]. The Kremlin communiqué [6] for their meeting last July acknowledged the two men discussed “stabilising the situation in the region and resolving any issues pertaining to Iran’s nuclear programme via political means.” The January 2026 communiqué [5] said they had met but nothing more.
Six weeks later, Larijani was targeted and killed in an air strike on Teheran on March 17. The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed credit for the assassination. “This morning, we eliminated Ali Larijani. Ali Larijani is the boss of the Revolutionary Guards, that group of gangsters that effectively runs Iran. Alongside him, we also eliminated the commander of the Basij [Brigadier General Gholamreza Soleimani [7]] – they are the gangsters’ assistants who are terrorizing the population in the streets of Teheran and other Iranian cities [8]. ”
President Donald Trump followed [9] the next day: “Their leaders are gone. I guess one of the — their top person [Larijani] was a — they say, a lot of people say their actual top was, uh, killed yesterday, along with somebody else [Soleimani], uh, that — who was responsible for the killing. The man that was responsible for the killing of 32,000 people over the last two weeks…Nobody wants to have — uh, nobody wants to have Iran or anybody, but nobody wants to have Iran with a nuclear — because these people are crazy. They’re absolutely crazy and they’re vicious, violent.”
Netanyahu’s word was “eliminated”. Trump’s word was “killed”. But Putin’s word was “passed away”.
What has Putin calculated he gains from falsifying the meaning of the killing and the Israeli and US officials who ordered it? The reporters meeting with Putin were unable to follow up.