Putin ‘wife beater and drunk letch’, German documentary claims 

A German documentary has claimed Russian leader Vladimir Putin regularly subjected his ex-wife to domestic abuse and was seen as a drunken letch by his Soviet superiors in his early days.

The controversial documentary also claims Putin is terrified of growing old, underwent face surgery in 2010 and is severely paranoid about being poisoned.

Putin the Man, made by ZDF television and shown for the first time this week, claims his divorced wife Lyudmila was regularly subjected to violence.

The makers of the show claim to have been given unprecedented access to previously unseen files of an unidentified Western intelligence agency.

The programme makers said sources and the secret documents suggest he has survived five assassination attempts in recent years that have led to his “leadership style with incredible delusions for control.”

The programme also said he was prepared to shoot unarmed protesters in East Germany during the peaceful revolution of 1989.

After rising from the slums of St Petersburg into the ranks of the KGB, contributors to the programme and the documents paint Putin as being initially a “lazy, drunken spy” when he headed the spy agency’s field office in Dresden.

One interviewee said that between 1985 and 1990, Putin “was a desktop spy, a macho playing upon a safe stage.”

“He was depressed, fat, lazy and disillusioned,” Mahsa Gessen, an author and activist told the documentary.

A file entry from the time noted how he got inebriated at the birthday party of a friend.

“Mrs H remembers that on the birthday party of her father he grabbed her particularly fiercely, hugging and kissing her. His colleagues in the KGB spoke about his fondness for hard liqour.”

Biographer Ben Judah said “Putin is afraid of physical decay, he is afraid of ageíng” while a secret document says he had face surgery in 2010 because he wanted a “young, dynamic appearance.”