Images have been released of Vladimir Putin’s secret country “shelter”, just 30km from the Finnish (and NATO) border.

The impressive mansion of the Russian president is “hidden” inside a huge protected forest area, larger than Monaco, built on the shores of Lake Ladoga, in the National Forest of Karelia.

Also, the “love nest” of the 71-year-old Russian president with the 40-year-old world-famous athlete Alina Kabaeva is located next to the idyllic Marjalahti waterfall.

In fact, the outwardly modest mansion has a futuristic gazebo with a full view of the waterfall, according to independent news agency Dossier Centre, which is owned by to the exiled anti-establishment businessman and former Russian oligarch, Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

His neighbor, just two and a half miles away, is said to be former Chelsea tycoon Roman Abramovich.

The mansion is very well camouflaged and hidden from public view. From a distance one can see only a barn, without suspecting that it is the country residence of the Russian president. ‘

But there are many buildings and a telltale sign that the place belongs to Putin’s vast portfolio of secret homes and palaces “hidden” from the Russian people.

“Behind the barn you can see a regular embankment, which probably hides an air defense system,” Dossier journalist Ilya Rozhdestvenskiy said.

In total within the grounds there are three modern houses, two helipads, several yacht docks, a trout farm and a cow farm.