‘We did it’: Ukraine claims it killed Russian general in Moscow scooter blast

Ukraine has claimed that they have killed Chief of Russia’s Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops, Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov on Tuesday morning in southeastern Moscow, Reuters and AFP reports cited a Ukrainian security source as saying.

Igor and his assistant were killed in a blast outside a residential apartment on Ryazansky Prospekt, a road that starts some 7 km (4.35 miles) southeast of the Kremlin.

‘Absolutely legitimate target’

A report by Reuters quoted a source in the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) as saying that Kyiv regarded Kirillov as a war criminal and an “absolutely legitimate target”, accusing him of ordering the use of prohibited chemical weapons against Ukrainian forces in the war.

Ukrainian media reports also mentioned that Kirillov was killed by the Ukrainian security services.

The Kyiv Independent and news agency RBC Ukraine, cited unnamed sources from the agency as saying that Kirillov was killed by the SBU.

‘Special operation’

A report by AFP quoted a source as saying that the killing of Kirillov was a “special operation” by Ukraine’s SBU security service.

“The liquidation of Lt Gen Igor Kirillov, chief of the Russian Armed Forces’ radiation, chemical and biological defence troops is a special operation by the SBU,” the source cited by AFP said.

“Such an inglorious end awaits all those who kill Ukrainians. Retribution for war crimes is inevitable,” the SBU source was quoted as saying by AFP.

Bomb hidden in scooter

A report by TASS quoted Svetlana Petrenko, spokeswoman for the Russian Investigative Committee, as saying that the blast occurred after an explosive device allegedly hidden in an electric scooter went off.

“On the morning of December 17, an explosive device planted in a scooter went off near a residential building entrance on Ryazansky Avenue in Moscow, the investigation showed. Chief of Russia’s Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection Troops Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov and his aide were killed in the explosion,” Petrenko said.

Earlier in the day, the Committee’s Moscow department has launched a criminal probe into the attack.

Images from the blast site, posted on Russian Telegram channels, showed a shattered entrance to a building littered with rubble and two bodies lying in the blood-stained snow.

The explosion occurred hours after, Ukrainian prosecutors on Monday charged Kirillov in absentia with the alleged use of banned chemical weapons in Ukraine, the Security Service of Ukraine said.

Russia denied those accusations.

In October, Britain sanctioned Kirillov and the nuclear protection forces for using riot control agents and multiple reports of the use of the toxic choking agent chloropicrin on the battlefield.

The UK alleged that Kirillov had overseen the use of chemical weapons in Ukraine and acted as a “significant mouthpiece for Kremlin disinformation”.

Russia’s radioactive, chemical and biological defence troops, known as RKhBZ, are special forces who operate under conditions of radioactive, chemical and biological contamination.

With inputs from agencies.