Mystery over glamorous ‘Russian crypto investor seen with Telegram founder Pavel Durov days before they flew to Paris on private jet’ as she ‘vanishes after his arrest’ and he spends second day in French custody over ‘failing to stop terrorism’

Mystery has grown surrounding a glamorous Russian crypto investor who was reportedly traveling with Telegram billionaire Pavel Durov before being apprehended in Paris.

The Dubai-based streamer is known as Yulia – or Yuli – Vavilova, 24, but this is reportedly not her real family name.

She appears to have disappeared since arriving in Paris with Durov, when he was held on the steps of his Embraer Legacy 600 private jet.

Photos have emerged of a blonde woman, who appears to be Vavilova, having breakfast with Durov and his colleagues in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, before they fly to Paris.

She is sitting next to Durov at the trendy Shore House Baku restaurant on the Caspian Sea, according to video footage released by Russian news outlet SHOT.

It is owned by Emin Agalarov, a Russian singer and son of tycoon Aras Agalarov, a friend of Donald Trump.

It is also believed that the two were together at a shooting range in Azerbaijan before leaving for Paris. There is video footage showing them from behind.

Vavilova’s family in Russia has reportedly been unable to reach her, leading to speculation whether she has been arrested or is in hiding.

She did not mention Durov’s name or show his face, but she accompanied him on a trip to Central Asia. Their relationship was reportedly known in certain circles in Dubai, where they both live.

The photos she posted showed a man’s hands and feet and she used the word “we” in her travel description, for example: “We got lost in a forest.”

She is seen from behind in a photo just before his plane leaves Baku for Paris, and she also shows her own photos on what is believed to be his plane.

She also posted an Instagram story about a private jet, captioned, “New destination unlocked… 3 hours from Kazakhstan,” before asking her followers to guess where she was in a poll titled “Where are we?”

The Telegram channel VChK-OGPU, with ties to the Russian security services, reported: ‘Yulia Vavilova and Pavel Durov did not exactly keep their relationship a secret, nor the fact that they planned to visit France after a tour of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Azerbaijan.’

In Kyrgyzstan, Durov is said to have taken her to the mountains in an eight-seater helicopter, insisting that his presence in the country remain secret.

What is known is that the highly educated Vavilova describes herself as a gamer, streamer and crypto investor and that she runs a cryptocurrency channel in Arabic, a language she speaks fluently.

Besides Russian, she also speaks fluent English and Spanish.

The “crypto coach” is from Moscow, but has been living in Dubai for about two years. Durov has been using it as his base of operations lately, after leading an itinerant existence since 2014, when he left his home country under pressure from the Putin regime to give his security services access to Telegram.

Her mother Ekaterina made it clear that she had not heard from her daughter since the plane landed in Paris.

“We get all the news through the media,” she told Komsomolskaya Pravda.

Our phones are red hot, but it’s only journalists calling.

‘Understand our position.’

She told news outlet BAZA that she was not answering her phone.

According to the newspaper, Yulia started using the name Vavilova when she went to Dubai.

Russian influencer Guseyn Gasanov, 30, was very successful at the breakfast in Baku and the helicopter flight to Kyrgyzstan.

Vavilova has about 45,000 followers on various platforms, including Telegram.

There is no indication that she is anything more than a successful businesswoman and influencer who has a romantic relationship with the mysterious Durov.

It is still unclear why Durov flew to Paris with Vavilova, knowing he could be arrested there.

The tech mogul behind the messaging app, who lives in self-imposed exile from his native Russia, is said to have been aware of a possible French criminal investigation.

He was detained at Le Bourget airport outside Paris on Saturday night, less than a week after Vladimir Putin abruptly refused to meet him when both men were in the Azerbaijani capital Baku, where a meeting had reportedly been brokered.

Instead, the Kremlin last week stepped up efforts to block or slow down Telegram in Russia.

Durov founded the so-called Russian Facebook, VK, and also the messenger Telegram, which is widely used for communication between both sides in the Ukrainian war. It is worth £13.6 billion.

He is expected to be charged with aiding Telegram in drug trafficking, child pornography and fraud, due to a lack of moderation controls and his refusal to cooperate with French law enforcement.

His Telegram empire is worth around £23.5 billion and he has been called the Mark Zuckerberg of Russia.

He recently announced that as a sperm donor he is the father of more than 100 children.

A pre-arrest video, likely filmed by Vavilova, shows him driving freely around Kazakhstan, shortly before travelling to Azerbaijan and then leaving for Paris.

The Kremlin said today: “We do not know exactly what Durov is accused of, we have not yet received any official statements.

“Let’s wait until the charges are made public, if they are. Then we can draw some preliminary conclusions.”

Russia has demanded consular access to Durov, TASS reports, but he is a French citizen and it is unlikely that this will be granted.