Ukraine's security service assassinated a Russian general on the street in Moscow. Igor Kirillov was the general in charge of nuclear, chemical and biological defense. He and one of his assistants were killed when a bomb placed in a scooter blew up.
The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) was behind the detonation of an explosive device planted in a scooter next to the entrance of an apartment building in Moscow, according to a Ukrainian source briefed on the matter who was granted anonymity because they're not authorized to speak publicly about sensitive operations.
The blast on Tuesday morning killed Kirillov and his assistant, who was not identified, according to Russian officials.
According to Ukraine, Kirillov was responsible for the use of banned chemical weapons in Ukraine. In October the UK sanctioned Russia him the use of these weapons.
Russian forces have openly admitted to using hazardous chemical weapons on the battlefield, with widespread use of riot control agents and multiple reports of the use of the toxic choking agent chloropicrin – first deployed on the battlefields of WW1...
Among those sanctioned today are the Radiological, Chemical and Biological Defence Troops of the Russian Armed Forces and its leader Igor Kirillov, responsible for helping deploy these barbaric weapons.
Kirillov also played a significant role in Russian propaganda against Ukraine, trying to justify the invasion on the grounds that Ukraine was manufacturing chemical weapons for western countries.
General Kirillov, who once headed a Russian military academy, was also prominent in Russia’s propaganda campaign against Ukraine and the West, frequently addressing the news media and appearing on television with unfounded claims. In 2023, for instance, he said that the United States was planning to use drones “designed to spread infected mosquitoes.”
General Kirillov also claimed that Russian forces had uncovered a Ukrainian chemical weapons production laboratory near Avdiivka, a Ukrainian city that Moscow’s troops captured in February. Part of the buildup to the war was an effort by Russia to portray Ukraine, without evidence, as a hub for producing weapons of mass destruction at the behest of the West.
Ukraine's security services recorded the assassination using a camera set up in a car across the street.
Video of the liquidation of the Lieutenant General of the Russian Armed Forces Igor Kirillov and his assistant Ilya Polikarpov (apparently a Major) as a result of an explosion of a planted IED in Moscow.
— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) December 17, 2024
One of the best and most successful operations of this kind in the entire… https://t.co/jUlaweLcVx pic.twitter.com/zTw5tirNFu
He is not the first person assassinated in Moscow by Ukrainian forces but he is the most high profile person targeted so far. Last month, Ukraine killed a Russian naval officer in Crimea using a car bomb.
An official in Ukraine’s security services told the Ukrainian Pravda outlet that the agency had orchestrated the car bomb attack in the Russian-controlled port city of Sevastopol that killed Valery Trankovsky, the chief of staff of the 41st Missile Brigade of the Russian navy’s Black Sea fleet.
The official said Trankovsky was “a war criminal” who had ordered missile strikes from the Black Sea at civilian targets in Ukraine. Russia has used warships from its Black Sea fleet, as well as strategic bombers, to conduct missile strikes on targets across Ukraine that have led to hundreds of civilian casualties...
Russian media reported that the explosion tore off Trankovsky’s legs and he died from blood loss.
Ukraine is also believed to be behind the killing of a Russian submarine commander who was shot in the city Krasnodar while out jogging.
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