Russia detains suspect over murder of top general, pledges to retaliate
- 18 December, 07:59
Russia said on Wednesday it arrested the suspect in the murder of top general Igor Kirillov in an explosion in Moscow.
The Russian Investigative committee, which probes the high-profile crime, stated on Wednesday that an Uzbek national has confessed to planting the explosive device in a scooter outside Kirillov’s apartment building upon the instructions of Ukraine’s Security Service, SBU. Lieutenant General Kirillov who was chief of Russia’s Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops, was killed, along with his aide, as the electric bomb in the scooter went off. The Russian Investigative committee said that the suspected murderer had arrived in Moscow to carry out the Ukrainian intelligence service’s assignment.
Russian Telegram channels on Wednesday shared the video of the suspect sitting in a van and telling that he had acted upon the orders of the Ukrainian intelligence service and received an improvised explosive device. Investigators cited the suspect as saying that he setup a CCTV camera in a car, which they said was watched in Ukraine’s Dnipro city by organizers of the assassination. The suspect further confessed that he donated the explosive device after Kirillov left his house in exchange for 100,000 euros and a European residency promised to him by the Ukrainian side.
Russia has vowed retaliation for its general’s murder, with Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova stating on Wednesday that everyone involved in the killing “would be found and punished”. She said Moscow would raise the assassination of its tip general by Ukraine at the UN security council on December 20.
It should be noted that Kirillov is probably the most high-profile killing of a Russian official organized by Ukraine.
