Russian authorities announced on Wednesday morning that they had detained an Uzbek citizen in connection with the death of General Igor Kirillov. He died on Tuesday, December 17, when an explosive device planted in an electric scooter that had been left at the entrance to an apartment building exploded.
"A citizen of Uzbekistan, born in 1995, has been arrested on suspicion of carrying out the attack that took the lives of the commander of the Russian radiological, chemical and biological protection forces, Igor Kirillov, and his assistant Ilya Polikarpov," investigators said in a statement.
It alleged that the 29-year-old suspect had admitted to being "recruited by Ukrainian special forces", and Russia's state news agency TASS said the man had been offered $100,000 and a trip to the European Union. The press service of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) said that the man was "suspected of committing a terrorist act".
What are they saying from Ukraine?
On Tuesday, a source from the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) told DW and other media that Kirillov's murder was an SBU operation. According to the special service, Kirillov is responsible for the use of banned chemical weapons by the Russian army against the Ukrainian military. At the same time, at the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion, Kirillov spread unfounded allegations that Ukraine was developing biological weapons.
According to an expert from the Ukrainian non-governmental analytical organization "Razumkov Center" Oleksiy Melnyk, this is not a terrorist act, but rather looks like sabotage. "If this is the work of the special services, then it is not a terrorist act," the expert told DW. "When two countries are at war and a serviceman is killed by enemy forces, this should be classified as an act of sabotage."
This is not the first such case
Officially, the SBU has not taken responsibility for the murder of Kirilov, nor has it in the past taken responsibility for the deaths of other Russian servicemen who died under similar circumstances. Statements in this direction have come only from media sources from the SBU. For example, in November 2023, a car carrying the chief of staff of the 41st missile ship and cutter brigade of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, Valery Trankovsky, was blown up in the Crimea annexed by Russia. At that time, the media, citing a source from the SBU, reported that the murder was a special services operation. According to the source, Trankovsky gave the order to launch cruise missiles from the Black Sea at Ukrainian civilian targets.
In the fall of 2023, a car carrying four FSB officers exploded in Russian-occupied Berdyansk, Zaporizhzhia Oblast. Among the dead was a "Russian war criminal who brutally tortured Ukrainian citizens", the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense said at the time. According to the GUR, "representatives of the Ukrainian movement" participated in the murder.
Ukrainians also die suddenly
However, in similar circumstances, not only Russians die, but also Ukrainians suspected of treason and war crimes. In early December 2024, for example, a car carrying the former head of the Elenovo penal colony, Sergei Yevsyukov, and his wife was blown up in Russian-occupied Donetsk. Yevsyukov died and his wife lost her leg.
In the summer, the SBU reported that Yevsyukov was suspected of mistreatment of prisoners of war. According to an investigation, he was involved in the deaths of Ukrainian prisoners of war in explosions at the Elenovo penal colony in July 2022.
In October, another Ukrainian citizen, the head of security at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, Andriy Korotkyi, died in a car explosion in Russian-occupied Energodar. According to the GUR, Korotkyi "took part in the repressions against the personnel of the nuclear power plant, in war crimes against the civilian population of the temporarily occupied Energodar".
In December 2023, Ilya Kiva, a former deputy of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, former police chief in Kiev and supporter of Vladimir Putin, was shot dead near Moscow. He fled to Russia shortly before the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. According to a number of media outlets, citing sources in the security services, the murder of Kiva was also a special operation of the SBU. A Ukrainian court had found Kiva guilty of a number of criminal offenses, in particular treason. He was sentenced in absentia to 14 years in prison and was put on the international wanted list.
Attacks on Russian propagandists
Several assassination attempts have also been made against Russian propagandists. In the spring of 2023, the car of the Kremlin-friendly writer Zakhar Prilepin was blown up on a highway in Russia. The driver of the car was killed and Prilepin was injured. He participated in the First and Second Chechen Wars, and since 2014 he has supported pro-Russian fighters in Donbas. In 2017, the SBU declared Prilepin a suspect in participating in the activities of a terrorist organization and financing terrorism.
Even earlier, in the summer of 2022, Daria Dugina, a publicist and supporter of Russia's war against Ukraine, was murdered. She died in a car that exploded - it belonged to her father, Alexander Dugin, who is considered the Kremlin's main ideologist.
Later, the FSB claimed to have solved the case, announcing that the Ukrainian special services were behind the crime. The perpetrator was identified as a Ukrainian citizen who left Russia shortly afterwards. Ukrainian authorities have denied these allegations.
Authors: Hanna Sokolova | Maxim Drabok