Denis Voronenkov

Denis Nikolayevich Voronenkov (Денис Николаевич Вороненков; 10 April 1971 – 23 March 2017) was a Russian politician who served as a member of the State Duma from 2011 to 2016.

As the son of a serviceman, Voronenkov won a place in the Leningrad Suvorov Military School, from which he graduated in 1988 and then immediately joined the Soviet Army.

In 1995 he completed a diploma level officers course at the Military University of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, prior to his transfer to the Military Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation.

He had worked in military and federal law enforcement since 1995, joining the Military Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation, initially as an investigator.

In 1996 he did another course at the Faculty of Law of Ryazan State University.

In 1999, he left the military to begin a career in politics.

In 1999, at the Moscow Academy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Russian Federation he successfully defended his thesis for the Degree of Candidate for Legal Sciences, titled 'Legal Nihilism and Legal Idealism (Theoretical and Legal Research)', Doctor of Law.

He had reached the position of deputy prosecutor by the time he left the military in 1999 in order to enter politics.

He was a member of the Unity party from 2000 to 2003 and the Communist Party of the Russian Federation from 2011 to 2016.

Voronenkov was born in Gorky, Russian SFSR.

He studied at the Suvorov Military School before joining the Soviet Army.

Voronenkov's first two children are his daughter Xenia (b. 2000) and his son Nikolay from his first marriage with Yulia.

The Ukrainian journalist Kostyantyn Doroshenko published the book «Aria of Mary» a biography of Maria Maksakova and her life with Voronenkov.(2021).

In 2000 Voronenkov became an employee for the State Duma faction of the Unity party.

In 2001, he became an advisor to the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, then being selected as the Deputy Mayor of Naryan-Mar and Deputy Governor of Nenets Autonomous District.

In 2001 he became an advisor of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation before becoming the Deputy Mayor of Naryan-Mar and Deputy Governor of Nenets Autonomous District.

Voronenkov then worked for the Federal Drug Control Service of Russia from 2004 until 2007.

In 2009 he defended his thesis on 'Theoretical and normative basis of judicial control in the mechanism of separation of powers', at the Russian Legal Academy of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation.

Voronenkov eventually came to hold the rank of colonel in the Russian army.

He then pursued an academic career as an associate professor; his last post before being elected an MP was (from February 2010) at the St. Petersburg Institute of International Trade, Economics and Law.

Voronenkov then joined the Communist Party and was elected to the State Duma in 2011.

Voronenkov was elected as a deputy for the Communist Party of the Russian Federation in the State Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, in 2011.

Voronenkov married former fellow Russian MP and opera singer Maria Maksakova Jr.. in March 2015.

The couple met while working on a bill regulating the export of cultural artifacts.

Each of them had two children from previous relationships.

In the 2016 legislative election he lost his seat to United Russia candidate Vladimir Panov.

The following month, Voronenkov renounced his Russian citizenship and emigrated to Ukraine with his wife, Maria Maksakova Jr.. There he became a vocal critic of Russian president, Vladimir Putin, and Russian foreign policy.

Although as a member of the State Duma, he had voted for Russia's annexation of Crimea, while in Ukraine he argued that the annexation had been illegal.

Their son was born in April 2016.

Voronenkov lost his bid for reelection in September 2016, taking third place (13.99%) in constituency No.129, located in his native Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, well behind the winner, United Russia candidate Vladimir Panov (42.39%).

He stepped down from the State Duma in October.

Later that month, Voronenkov announced that he had given up his Russian citizenship and left for Ukraine, where he was naturalized as a Ukrainian citizen in December.

Voronenkov said that he had no intention of entering Ukrainian politics.

He was expelled from the Communist Party in 2016.

After he moved to Ukraine, he became known as a sharp critic of Russian president Vladimir Putin and Russian policy towards Ukraine.

Before stepping down as an MP in Russia, he had however taken part in the parliamentary vote to annex Crimea from Ukraine, for which he was criticised in Ukraine.

In early 2017, the Investigative Committee of Russia opened a case to look into Voronenkov's suspected corruption, and an investigation by the anti-corruption blogger and Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny found that Voronenkov possessed significantly more assets than his officially-declared income would allow.

Voronenkov was shot dead in Kyiv by a Ukrainian national, Pavlo Parshov.

Ukrainian prosecutors believe that it had been a contract killing (arranged by an FSB officer) while the country's then-president, Petro Poroshenko, alleged that it had been orchestrated by the Russian government.

Denis Nikolayevich Voronenkov was born in Gorky (now Nizhny Novgorod), Russian SFSR, but had a Ukrainian grandmother and (according to his widow) spent his childhood in Ukraine's Kherson Oblast.