FSB eliminates Ukrainian saboteur in dramatic standoff (VIDEO)
Russian security services have eliminated a Ukrainian operative during a tense confrontation in Russia’s Zaporozhye Region, the Federal Security Service (FSB) said on Friday.
The individual, who has not been named, had reportedly been working with Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, known as the GUR, to target a local law enforcement officer.
When FSB agents moved to arrest him, the saboteur barricaded himself in a residential building, according to the FSB. The standoff ended with the Ukrainian operative killed in a firefight, although he reportedly first managed to detonate a hand grenade, which caused moderate damage to the building.
A handgun, an improvised explosive device (IED), and fragments of a hand grenade were recovered from the scene, the FSB said.The operative’s firearm, a Makarov pistol, appears to have a threaded barrel suitable to accept a silencer attachment.
Over the course of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, multiple Russian officials and public figures have been killed in assassinations attributed to Kiev’s spy agencies. Numerous plots, involving both Russian and Ukrainian nationals, have also been foiled by Russia’s security agencies.
Late in December, the FSB said it thwarted a Ukrainian plot to assassinate a prominent military blogger and a high-ranking Russian officer with an IED disguised as a portable music speaker and filled with ball bearings for added lethality. The suspect, a Russian national recruited by the GUR, was apprehended by the FSB, while the bomb was safely defused.
