The 69-year-old Kremlin leader is believed to have two secret sons with the Olympic gold-winning rhythmic gymnast, once dubbed ‘the most flexible woman in Russia’.

Anthony Albanese joined a chorus of world leaders slamming the Russian leader after an attack on a shopping mall in Ukraine killed at least 18 civilians.

Boris Johnson, Canada’s Justin Trudeau and European commission president Ursula von der Leyen all mocked the Russian dictator as they sat down for discussions in Bavaria.

An FSB officer described the Russian president’s condition as a ‘severe form of rapidly progressing cancer’, as speculation of Putin’s ailing health condition continues to mount.

Christopher Steele, who operated in Russia as an MI6 agent, said Putin, 69, is taking regular breaks to receive medical treatments and that there was ‘no clear political leadership’ in Moscow.

Simeon Boikov, the self-styled ‘Aussie Cossack’, held a boozy pro-Russia party on Sydney Harbour with bikies, diplomats and his glamorous wife Katia celebrating Russia’s World War II victory.

Lt-Col Fezul Bichikaev, 36, (pictured) has become the 39th Russian colonel to die in Ukraine. It came ahead of Putin’s ahead of his Victory Day military extravaganza in Moscow tomorrow.

Officers boarded The Scheherazade to serve paperwork to the yacht’s British captain Guy Bennett Pearce, telling him it would be unable to set sail from the dry dock near Pisa.

Russian troops entered Ukraine at the end of February in what Putin called a ‘special military operation’ to demilitarise and ‘denazify’ Ukraine and barred the use of the word ‘war’.

Speaking to reporters as he flew to India for a two-day diplomatic trip, Mr Johnson said ‘It’s very difficult’ to see how Ukraine can negotiate with Putin given his ‘lack of good faith’.