Ukraine Arrests Suspected Russian Agent in Assassination Plot

Iruni Kalupahana, JadeTimes Staff

I. Kalupahana is a Jadetimes news reporter covering Russia-Ukraine war

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Image source: Gleb Garanich

Ukraine has arrested and charged a suspect who allegedly carried out assassinations and arranged explosions at the behest of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), the Ukrainian prosecutor general's office stated in a statement on Tuesday.

The suspect, a 56 years old man from the Crimean Peninsula with a previous criminal record, is accused of murdering a Ukrainian soldier in March 2024. He was acting on direct orders from Russian intelligence services, officials say.

The suspect is also accused of planting a bomb under the car of Kharkiv official Vyacheslav Zadorenko. But Zadorenko discovered the device in time, preventing a potential assassination.

In addition, the prosecutors charge the suspect with conspiring to murder Oleh Synyehubov, head of the Kharkiv regional administration, in exchange for a reward of $50,000. He is also charged with exploding bombs at key infrastructure facilities in Kharkiv, a city in northeastern Ukraine that has been under repeated attack throughout the conflict.

This arrest comes after a surge in targeted attacks against Ukrainian government officials. A few days earlier, a local lawmaker had been killed by a car bomb in the city of Dnipro.

Since Russia's large scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, both nations have attempted assassinations of political and military leaders, according to reports. In May 2023, Ukrainian counterintelligence said it had thwarted a Russian plot to assassinate President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, along with the heads of Ukraine's intelligence agencies.

President Zelenskyy has already admitted that there have been numerous attempts on his life since fighting began, now in its fourth year.