 "Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov was killed in a bomb blast in Moscow. Source: X")
A top Russian general has been killed.
Igor Kirillov, the chief of Russia’s Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection troops, died in a bomb blast in Moscow.
Lieutenant General Kirillov is reported to have been targeted for assassination by Ukraine’s security agency.
But who was he? And how was he killed?
Let’s take a closer look:
Who was he?
As per The Independent, Kirillov was a senior member of the Kremlin.
His agency is formally known as the RKhBZ.
Its troops are called in whenever there is a radioactive, chemical and biological contamination.
Their job is to guard ground forces who are functioning in extreme conditions.
The 54-year-old was appointed to the post in 2017, as per Moscow Times.
According to BBC, Kirillov was previously the chief of Russia’s Timoshenko Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection Academy.
His troops have been accused of using “barbaric chemical weapons in Ukraine ” including “multiple reports of the use of the toxic choking agent chloropicrin.”
The day before Kirillov was killed, Ukraine’s SBU security agencies said he was charged in absentia for the ‘mass use’ of prohibited chemical weapons in Ukraine .
The SBU described the use “more than 4,800 cases of the enemy using chemical munitions” on its country’s territory since the beginning of the war.
“Russia’s cruel and inhumane tactics on the battlefield are abhorrent and I will use the full arsenal of powers at my disposal to combat Russia’s malign activity,” foreign secretary David Lammy said in October as per The Independent.
It said Kirillov’s forces used toxic substances in drone attacks and combat grenades.
Russia has denied using chemical weapons in Ukraine .
According to Moscow Times, the UK in October sanctioned Kirillov and his forces in October.
The UK Home Office called Kirillov a “significant mouthpiece for Russian disinformation.”
Kirillov has claimed that the West and their biolabs are is to blame for the spread of infectious diseases, including Covid-19.
He has also accused the West of planning to give Ukraine biological weapons and claimed that they are targeting Russian troops with malaria-infected mosquitos.
Kirillov has also claimed that Kyiv is using chemical weapons against Russia .
Kirillov in October claimed that the Ukrainian military used Western-made chemical weapons in Russia’s Kursk.
As per BBC, Kirillov recently claimed that “one of the priority aims” of Ukraine’s counter-offensive into Russia’s Kursk border region was to seize control of the region’s nuclear power plant.
Kirillov in 2022 claimed that Ukraine was also developing a ‘dirty bomb.’
As per BBC, Kirillov claimed that “two organisations in Ukraine have specific instructions to create a so-called ‘dirty bomb’. This work is in its final stage”.
The West rejected his accusations as “transparently false”.
How was he killed?
As per CNN, Kirillov was killed via a remotely detonated bomb.
The IED was planted in an electric scooter outside an apartment building around seven kilometres from the Kremlin.
Kirillov’s assistant was also killed in the explosion.
The outlet quoted Russian state agency TASS as reporting that the power of the explosion roughly equated to around 300 grams of TNT.
The site has been cordoned off, TASS further reported.
A source told CNN that Ukraine’s security service assassinated Kirillov’s assassination.
“Kirillov was a war criminal and an absolutely legitimate target, as he gave orders to use banned chemical substances against the Ukrainian military,” the source said. “Such an inglorious end awaits all those who kill Ukrainians. Retribution for war crimes is inevitable.”
BBC quoted Konstantin Kosachev, the deputy speaker of Russia’s parliament as calling Kirillov’s death an “irreparable loss”.
Kirillov is survived by his wife and two sons, as per Moscow Times.
With inputs from agencies