‘Ukrainian agent' involved in Russian general's assassination detained – FSB (VIDEO)
Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) has reported that it detained a Ukrainian operative who is suspected of planting a bomb that killed a Russian two-star general serving as deputy operations chief of the General Staff on Friday.
In a statement released on Saturday, the Russian authorities said the explosive device, which was hidden in a parked car, was activated remotely from Ukraine.
The man, identified as Ignat Kuzin, who has a residence permit in Ukraine, purchased the Volkswagen Golf used in the assassination of Lt. Gen. Yaroslav Moskalik, the FSB said. According to the officials, the suspect retrieved the components for the bomb from a cache and planted the explosive device inside the vehicle.
Moskalik, the deputy chief of operations of Russia's General Staff, was killed outside his residence in Balashikha, a suburb east of Moscow. Russia's Investigative Committee said that the explosive device was packed with metal fragments for additional lethality. The news agency TASS reported that investigators estimated the yield of the bomb as the equivalent of 300 grams of TNT.
Along with the statement, the FSB released a video depicting the suspect's apprehension, as well as his subsequent interrogation. In it, the 42-year-old man said that he had been 'recruited by Ukrainian special services, by a handler, Vadim, in Kiev Region in April 2023.' According to the testimony, Kuzin arrived in Moscow in September of the same year.
'In February 2025, I bought the Volkswagen on [Vadim's] orders,' the suspect recounted, adding that later that month he received the coordinates of the cache containing the explosive materials and a camera.
The man said that the 'explosion itself was carried out remotely by Vadim the handler.'
On Friday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov stated that the 'Kiev regime once again shows its essence' by continuing to 'engage in terrorist activities' on Russian soil.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova similarly stated that should Ukrainian involvement in the assassination of the general be confirmed, it would demonstrate the 'barbarian and treacherous nature of the Kiev regime.'
Ukraine is betting on escalating the conflict and 'irresponsibly ignoring constructive proposals' to settle it through diplomacy, the diplomat noted.
Last December, a bomb that Russian authorities similarly linked to Ukrainian special services killed Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, who served as the commander of the Russian Radiological, Chemical, and Biological Defense Forces. He was assassinated alongside an aide as they were coming out of a building in Moscow.
The attack involved an explosive device hidden inside an electric scooter, which was placed next to the entrance and monitored through a camera set up in a parked car, which enabled the perpetrators to detonate it remotely.
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