Russian general killed in Moscow car bomb blast, investigators say

A car bomb killed a Russian general on Monday, the third killing of a senior army officer in just over a year. Investigators said Ukraine may have been behind the attack.

Lt. Gen. Fanil Sarvarov, head of the Operational Training Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, died of his wounds, said Svetlana Petrenko, a spokeswoman for the Russian Investigative Committee, the country’s top criminal investigative agency. He was 56 years old.

“Investigators are pursuing numerous lines of inquiry regarding the murder. One of them is that the crime was orchestrated by Ukrainian intelligence services,” Petrenko said.

Since Moscow sent troops to Ukraine almost four years ago, Russian authorities have blamed kyiv for several assassinations of military officers and public figures in Russia. Ukraine claimed responsibility for some of them. He has not yet commented on Monday’s death.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said President Vladimir Putin was immediately informed of the assassination of Sarvarov, who fought in Chechnya and took part in Moscow’s military campaign in Syria.

Russia has blamed Ukraine for a series of other apparent assassinations.

Just over a year ago, Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, head of the military’s nuclear, biological and chemical protection forces, was killed by a bomb hidden on an electric scooter in front of his apartment building. Kirillov’s assistant also died. Ukrainian security services claimed responsibility for the attack.

An Uzbek man was quickly arrested and charged with Kirillov’s murder on behalf of Ukrainian security services.

Putin called Kirillov’s assassination a “major mistake” by Russia’s security agencies, stressing that they should learn from it and improve their effectiveness.

In April, another senior Russian army officer, Lt. Gen. Yaroslav Moskalik, deputy head of the General Staff’s main operational department, was killed by an explosive device placed in his car parked near his apartment building just outside Moscow. The alleged perpetrator was quickly arrested.

Days after Moskalik’s assassination, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he had received a report from the head of Ukraine’s foreign intelligence services about the “liquidation” of senior Russian military officials, adding that “justice inevitably comes,” although he did not mention Moskalik by name.

Surprise attacks

Ukraine, outnumbered by the larger and better equipped Russian army, has often attempted to change the course of the conflict by attacking unexpectedly.

In August last year, Ukrainian forces staged a surprise incursion into Russia’s Kursk region, even as they struggled to stem Russian offensives on many parts of the front line. Moscow’s troops eventually drove them out, but the incursion diverted Russian military resources from other areas and boosted Ukrainian morale.

Ukraine has also launched repeated attacks on the Russian navy in the Black Sea with maritime drones and missiles, forcing it to relocate its warships and limit the scale of its operations.

And in June, swarms of drones launched from trucks targeted bomber bases across Russia. Ukraine said more than 40 long-range bombers were damaged or destroyed, while Moscow said only a few planes were hit.

Meanwhile, Western officials have accused Russia of mounting a campaign away from the battlefield, accusing it of orchestrating dozens of incidents of disruption and sabotage across Europe as part of an effort to undermine support for Ukraine. Moscow has denied the allegations.