Ukraine Kills Russia's Nuclear, Bio, Chem Chief General With Remote Moscow Bomb

Lieutenant General Kirillov was killed for ordering and overseeing the illegal use of chemical weapons against Ukrainian troops. 

He was killed by a remote controlled bomb hidden in a scooter parked near his apartment building. One might argue that this assassination saved him from eventually 'falling out of a window' like so many of his colleagues. JL

David Stern and Leo Sands report in the Washington Post:

Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, chief of Russia’s nuclear, biological and chemical defense forces was killed in Moscow on Tuesday morning in a “special operation” by Ukraine’s security service. Kirillov, 54, was killed alongside his assistant when an explosive device on a parked scooter detonated near the entrance of a residential building in the capital. Investigators retrieved fragments of an explosive device from the scene. Ukraine said Kirillov was a “legitimate target since he gave orders to use banned chemical weapons against the Ukrainian military.”

The head of Russia’s nuclear defense forces was killed in Moscow on Tuesday morning in a “special operation” by Ukraine’s domestic security service, according to a Ukrainian official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter.

 

Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, chief of Russia’s nuclear, biological and chemical defense forces, is the highest-ranking Russian military official to be killed outside of combat since the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Russia’s Investigative Committee said Tuesday that Kirillov, 54, was killed alongside his assistant when an explosive device on a parked scooter detonated near the entrance of a residential building in the capital. Investigators retrieved fragments of an explosive device from the scene of Kirillov’s killing, which they said is being investigated as a suspected “terrorist act.”

An electric scooter at the scene of the explosion in Moscow on Tuesday. (Yuri Kochetkov/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)

The Ukrainian official said Tuesday that Kirillov was an “absolutely legitimate target since he gave orders to use banned chemical weapons against the Ukrainian military.”

 

On Monday, Ukraine’s domestic security service, also known as the SBU, charged Kirillov in absentia for his role in directing the use of banned chemical weapons against its forces, an accusation Kyiv had previously leveled against him.

Ukrainian authorities said Monday that on Kirillov’s orders, such weapons have been used more than 4,800 times on the southern and eastern fronts of Ukraine since the invasion began, resulting in injuries to Kyiv’s troops.

In May, the State Department sanctioned Kirillov’s unit after determining that Russia used chloropicrin, a choking agent, against Ukrainian troops, in violation of Moscow’s commitments under the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention.

The blast comes a week after the reported death, also in Moscow, of a top Russian cruise missile engineer who helped develop missiles used in the war in Ukraine.

Russian Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, in an image taken from video. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service/AP)

Kirillov played a prominent role in spreading the Kremlin’s misleading claims that the United States had established biowarfare labs in Ukraine — claims that were repeated Tuesday by top-ranking officials in tributes to the general.

 

Andrey Kartapolov, head of the Defense Committee in Russia’s lower house of parliament, said Kirillov highlighted U.S. “activities in organizing laboratories around the world.”

The Post has previously documented that the labs in Ukraine were biological research facilities focused on better detecting, diagnosing and monitoring infectious-disease outbreaks.

In October, Britain sanctioned Kirillov for his role in helping to deploy chemical weapons on the battlefield in Ukraine. “Kirillov has also been a significant mouthpiece for Kremlin disinformation, spreading lies to mask Russia’s shameful and dangerous behavior,” the British government said in a statement at the time.

Senior naval officer Valery Trankovsky was previously the highest-ranking Russian military official to be killed outside of combat since the war in Ukraine began. He was killed last month in a car explosion in Sevastopol, in Russian-occupied Crimea.