A key suspect has been arrested in the hunt for the killers of a top Russian general in Moscow.
Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, 54, in charge of Russia’s biological, chemical and radiological defense troops, was killed in a bomb explosion as he left his apartment building early Tuesday.
The Russian FSB detained a citizen of Uzbekistan born in 1995 ‘suspected of having committed a terrorist act that killed Igor Kirillov’, the Russian Investigative Committee said.
It was alleged that he had been promised US$100,000 and a future life in an unnamed European country.
The suspect is accused of setting off the explosion from his home in the Moscow region while his foremen watched from Dnipro, Ukraine, via a live camera hidden in a car at the scene.
His identity was discovered in a joint operation by the FSB (Federal Security Service), the Investigative Committee and Russia’s Interior Ministry, the FSB said.
The detainee left a motorcycle containing an improvised explosive device at the entrance to the residential block where Kirillov lived, according to the Mash media.
A second suspect arranged a carpool delivery to the location where a Wi-Fi camera was secretly monitoring the door, allowing the bomb to explode remotely when Kirillov and his assistant Ilya Polikarpov, 33, appeared.
Both men died instantly.
The Russian FSB detained a citizen of Uzbekistan born in 1995 ‘suspected of having committed a terrorist act that killed Igor Kirillov’, the Russian Investigative Committee stated
Investigators work near a scooter at the site where Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, head of Russia’s Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Defense Forces, and his assistant Ilya Polikarpov were killed by an explosive device.
The general and his assistant are seen leaving the apartment seconds before the deadly explosion.
The explosion occurred seconds after the general left his apartment.
Kirillov had served as Chief of the Radiological, Chemical and Biological Defense Troops of the Russian Armed Forces since 2017.
Bodies are seen at the site of the explosion, in which the commander of the chemical, biological and radiological defense troops of the Russian armed forces, Igor Kirillov, and his assistant were killed.
The Russian Investigative Committee and the FSB issued a lengthy statement following the arrest and interrogation of the Uzbek suspect.
«During interrogation, he explained that he had been recruited by the Ukrainian special services.
«Following his instructions, he arrived in Moscow and received an improvised explosive device.
He placed it on an electric scooter and parked it at the entrance to the apartment block where Igor Kirillov lived.
«To monitor the soldier’s residence, he rented a car-sharing vehicle, in which he installed a video surveillance camera.
‘The images from this camera were transmitted online to the organizers of the terrorist attack in the city of Dnieper.
‘After the video signal of the military leaving the entrance, he detonated the explosive device remotely.
“The agents of the Ukrainian special services involved in the organization of the terrorist act will be found and punished,” the security agency promised.
The main suspect was detained in the village of Chernoye, Balashikha district, Moscow region.
Media reports said that a second man who allegedly parked the car containing the live streaming camera was also detained, but this was not confirmed in official reports.
The second suspect may have been used “blindly,” unaware that he was involved in a Ukrainian plot to assassinate one of Vladimir Putin’s most prominent generals, Mash reported.
“The suspects were located at the crime scene, where surveillance cameras recorded two suspicious cars,” Kommersant newspaper reported.
“The organizers contacted the men via instant messaging and gave them the contacts of (an agent) from the SBU (Ukrainian security service).”
It is understood the bomb was hidden inside an electric scooter when it detonated
Two body bags can be seen after bomb was detonated outside Moscow apartment
Two bodies can be seen as bystanders watch emergency crews at the scene.
Footage taken after the explosion shows a smashed car as emergency crews rushed to the scene.
The audacious bombing of the capital Moscow has shocked Russians, some of whom left the scene of the assassination in tribute to the dead general and his aide.
The SBU insisted that Kirillov was a legitimate target, accusing him of plotting the use of banned chemical weapons against Ukrainian troops.
Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev promised in a message to Kirillov’s relatives “imminent retribution” for the perpetrators “including the top military and political leaders of the missing country (Ukraine).”
Now deputy head of the Russian security council and a close acolyte of Putin, he told a meeting aimed at increasing military supplies for the war: “Our colleague and comrade, Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, was killed in a terrorist attack.”
‘He was a military commander, dedicated to his duty and his oath.
‘All of us who were here at this table knew him as a very good professional and as a decent and responsible person.
‘Even though the investigation has just begun, our enemies have already rushed to publish information about their involvement.
“But in any case, law enforcement agencies must find the killers in Russia. And everything must be done to destroy those who ordered it and who are in Kyiv.
“These clients are also well-known, they are the military-political leaders of Ukraine… The work of the defense industry should in no way relax.”