A senior Russian army official was killed Tuesday morning in an explosion near a residential building in the southeast of Moscow, a rare attack claimed by kyiv in the midst of a Russian offensive in Ukraine.
“The commander of the Russian radiological, chemical and biological defense forces, Igor Kirillov, and his assistant were killed” in the explosion caused by the triggering of an explosive device, announced the Russian Investigative Committee, which opened an investigation for “assassination”, “attack” and “arms trafficking”.
General Kirillov, 54, sanctioned in October by London for alleged deployment of chemical weapons in Ukraine, is the most senior Russian military official to have been killed in Moscow since the start of the Russian offensive against its Ukrainian neighbor in February 2022 .
The unit he led does not deal with the nuclear arsenal held by Russia.
The Kremlin and Vladimir Putin have not yet commented on the subject.
The assassination of Igor Kirillov, a rare event in the heavily protected Russian capital, was immediately claimed by the Ukrainian security services (SBU) who had already accused the Russian general on Monday of “war crimes” for having ordered, according to kyiv, the use of chemical weapons against Ukrainian troops.
It “is a special SBU operation,” a source within the Ukrainian security services told AFP.
“Very loud noise”
According to Russian investigators, the explosive device was placed on a scooter parked near the entrance to a residential building on Ryazansky Avenue in Moscow.
According to an AFP journalist on site, the windows of several apartments were broken by the explosion, and a cordon of police was deployed around them.
The entrance to the building was heavily damaged.
“The sound of the explosion was very loud,” Mikhail Mashkov, a 19-year-old student who lives in a nearby building, told AFP.
“There is a construction site nearby, and there is often noise, but we didn’t even think that something so terrible could have happened,” said Anastassia Magomedova, a 39-year-old housewife. years.
“Then we saw a lot of police and it became clear that something (unusual) had happened,” she added.
“Unprecedented crime”
“An unprecedented crime was committed in Moscow,” wrote the Russian daily Kommersant on his site.
General Kirillov was the one who “spoke, during his briefings, about American biological weapons laboratories in Ukraine”, of which Moscow accused Washington, recalls Kommersant.
In office since April 2017, Igor Kirillov was sanctioned in October by the United Kingdom for “deploying barbaric chemical weapons in Ukraine”.
On Monday, on the eve of the general’s assassination, the Ukrainian security services (SBU) accused him, in a press release, of being responsible for “massive use of chemical weapons” against Ukrainian forces.
Since February 2022, more than 4,800 cases of use of “chemical munitions” by the Russian army have been recorded, the SBU assured.
Russian authorities have repeatedly rejected these accusations, calling them “absurd.”
« Tentative d’intimidation »
Reactions from Russian leaders quickly poured in.
“Attempts to intimidate our people, stop the advance of the Russian army and sow fear are doomed to failure,” responded former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, known for his anti-kyiv diatribes and anti-West since 2022.
Vyacheslav Volodin, the president of the Duma, for his part praised the career of Igor Kirillov, “a professional soldier”, “a patriot”. A minute of silence was also observed during a session of the lower house of Parliament.
The spokesperson for Russian diplomacy, Maria Zakharova, deplored on Telegram the loss of a “intrepid” general, who fought “for the Fatherland and for the truth”.
For his part, the vice-president of the Federation Council, the upper house of the Russian Parliament, Konstantin Kosachev, promised that “the murderers will be punished. Without doubt and without pity.”
On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin took stock of the 2024 fighting in Ukraine, during a meeting with officials of the Ministry of Defense, welcoming the pace of the advance of his troops and having “the initiative » across the entire front at the end of this “pivotal year”.
“According to one clue, the attack could have been prepared for this meeting at the Ministry of Defense with the participation of Vladimir Putin,” says the daily Kommersant.
