A spokesman for the German Foreign Ministry and the Russian diplomatic representation in Germany confirmed today, Friday, that the body of a Russian diplomat was found in October in front of his country's embassy in central Berlin.

"We confirm that a tragic incident happened to an employee of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in Germany on October 19, 2021," the Russian embassy in Berlin said in a statement.

"All procedures related to the return of the diplomat's body to his home country were quickly settled by the competent German police and medical authorities, according to established practices," she added.

A spokesman for the German Foreign Ministry said that "the ministry was aware" of the case, but would not disclose additional details.

Police removed the man's body on October 19 from the sidewalk, after he apparently fell from the embassy compound, according to the weekly Der Spiegel, which first reported the case.

The magazine said that the Russian embassy did not accept to inspect the diplomat's body, and that the circumstances of the fall and the cause of death were still "unknown."

The magazine quoted the Russian embassy as saying that the diplomat's death was a "tragic accident", and that it would not comment on the case for "moral reasons".

Der Spiegel presented the diplomat as a 35-year-old second secretary at the embassy, ​​but added that German authorities believed he was an agent of Russian intelligence, which also handles counter-terrorism.

For its part, the Russian embassy in Berlin denied this information, describing it as "completely false."

He was also reported to be in contact with a high-ranking official in Unit Two of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), a unit accused by Western intelligence of being involved in the 2019 killing of Georgian citizen Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, 40, in central Berlin in 2019.

Khangoshvili was shot twice in the head at close range in the Kleiner Tiergarten park on August 23, 2019, by a Russian suspect who was arrested shortly thereafter.

The suspect, Vadim Krasikov, known as Vadim Sokolov, 55, is on trial for murder, and German prosecutors say Moscow ordered the operation.