Russia detains suspect over general’s killing in Moscow
Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov was killed outside an apartment complex on Tuesday morning local time when a bomb concealed in a parked electric scooter was detonated.
A 29-year-old man from Uzbekistan has been detained over the killing of senior general Igor Kirillov and his assistant in Moscow, Russias security service has confirmed.
Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov was killed outside an apartment complex on Tuesday morning local time when a bomb concealed in a parked electric scooter was detonated.
The suspect was recruited by Ukrainian intelligence, according to state media agencies.
A Ukrainian source told the BBC the killing was organised by Ukraine’s security service.
On Wednesday, the Russian Federal Security Service’s (FSB) public relations centre said the detained 29-year-old was “suspected of committing a terrorist attack”.
The Russian Investigative Committee said Kirillov’s assistant, Ilya Polikarpov, also died – the most audacious and high-profile attack carried out by Ukrainian spies.
Kyiv has accused Kirillov of running a deadly military program that oversees the production and battlefield use of chemical weapons.
Footage published by the Financial Times, shot from inside a parked car near the scene, shows the men exiting the building to get into a waiting vehicle when the explosion occurred.
In it, a scooter can be seen leaning against the wall of the building just next to the front door.
A photograph obtained by news agencies shows the charred remains of the scooter.
Russian state media said the bomb, which contained up to one kilogram of explosive materials, was detonated remotely.
An image circulating on Telegram, shot from above from inside the building, shows the bodies of the pair on the ground below.
Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who is now a senior security official, chaired a meeting shortly after that was broadcast on state television.
Medvedev described the attack as an act of terrorism and vowed vengeance.
“Law enforcement agencies must find the killers in Russia,” he said.
“Everything must be done to destroy the masterminds who are in Kyiv. We know who these masterminds are. They are the military and political leadership of Ukraine.”
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova slammed the failure of leaders in the West to condemn the assassination.
“An entire day has passed – where is at least some sort of reaction from abroad?” Zakharova wrote on Telegram. “Where are the ‘civilised’ ones? The ‘objective’ ones?”
Russian President Vladimir Putin is yet to comment.
A bomb disposal robot was deployed to the scene to inspect a parked rental car on the street, the BBC reported.
Ukraine’s intelligence service SBU orchestrated the operation, a source told wire service Reuters, describing it as “the liquidation of the chief of the radiation and chemical protection troops of the Russian Federation”.
The attack came a day after the SBU issues a ‘notice of suspicion’ – a declaration on par with an arrest warrant – naming Kirillov for “war crimes committed” against Ukrainian soldiers.
“Kirillov was a war criminal and a completely legitimate target, as he gave orders to use banned chemical weapons against the Ukrainian military,” another SBU source told the Financial Times.
“Such an inglorious end awaits all who kill Ukrainians. Retribution for war crimes is inevitable.”
The United Kingdom imposed strict sanctions on the top military leader in October for what it called “the deployment of barbaric chemical weapons in Ukraine”, including chloropicrin, a toxic agent that causes acute choking.
Russia denies possessing chemical weapons.
The UK also described Kirillov as a “significant mouthpiece for Russian disinformation”, including discredited claims that Ukraine was conspiring to detonated a “dirty” nuclear bomb in Moscow.
“To some in the West, Kirillov was a ridiculous, almost comical character, prone to spouting wild theories with no basis in fact,” BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner wrote in analysis today.
“He reportedly claimed that Covid was a US plot to infect Russia, for example.
“But there is nothing comical about the order he allegedly gave to deploy the chemical agent chloropicrin against Ukrainian troops dug-in in frontline trenches in the Donbas.”
The use of chloropicrin is illegal under Schedule 3 of the Chemical Weapons Convention, to which Russia is a signatory.
“It causes extreme irritation and pain in the eyes and lungs and – although not usually lethal in open spaces where it can disperse – has an obvious tactical benefit on the battlefield.
“In a desperate attempt to escape its effects, Ukrainian infantry have been known to exit their trenches where they can then be picked off by drones or snipers on open ground.”
While Kirillov is Ukraine’s most prominent scalp to date, he isn’t the first.
Earlier this month, a car bomb took out the former operator of a Russian prison in occupied city of Donetsk, where Kyiv believes dozens of Ukrainian prisoners of war were murdered.
And in October, Russian Air Force Colonel Dmitry Golenkov was reportedly bludgeoned to death with hammers in the Bryansk region.
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