[throwaway74354]

Nikolai Durov lives in Saint Petersburg and works for the Russian Academy of Sciences. Pavel Durov had visited Russia multiple time since his "exile".

The public-facing story around Telegram is performative PR, which could be explained by the exact reasons listed in the parent comments: association with the Russian state had hindered VK growth besides the CIS region.

[buyucu]

I can't verify this anywhere. The latest information appears to be that Nikolai Durov lives in Dubai.

[throwaway74354]

Wikipedia quotes https://www.bbc.com/russian/articles/cdjwm9eew0xo , which uses this article as a source: https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/6920516