The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), successor to the KGB, said in a statement carried by Russian news agencies that it had arrested four Russians accused of preparing the murder of senior Defense Ministry officials.
The FSB claimed that the suspected organizers of the attacks planned to kill one of the senior officers using a remote-controlled car bomb. He added that another senior military official was to be assassinated by an explosive device hidden in an envelope. The agency did not name the military officers targeted in the alleged plot.
The FSB released a video showing the arrest and interrogation of the suspects, who were not named.
This statement comes after the death of Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, killed on December 17 by a bomb hidden on an electric scooter parked in front of his building as he was leaving for his office. Igor Kirillov's aide also died in the brazen attack claimed by Ukraine and which brought conflict back to the streets of the Russian capital.
The FSB arrested one suspect, a citizen of the Central Asian country Uzbekistan, and said he said he had been recruited by Ukrainian special services.
Lieutenant Kirillov, 54, was the head of Russia's radiation, bacteriological and chemical protection forces. These special troops are responsible for protecting the army against the use of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons by the enemy and ensuring operations in a contaminated environment.
Russian President Vladimir Putin called the assassination of Igor Kirillov a “grave mistake” by Russian security agencies, noting that they should learn from it and improve their effectiveness.
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