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The Ukrainian Security Service said it foiled a Russian plot to assassinate President Volodymyr Zelensky by striking his convoy with missiles and drones, calling it the latest attempt by Moscow to eliminate the Ukrainian leader.
The agency, known as the SBU, said it had detained two senior officers in the country’s Department of State Security, which is responsible for protecting the president.
The SBU said they were two of five agents working on the plot under the direction of Russia’s Federal Security Service, the FSB.
Malyuk said the plot was supposed to be a “gift” for Russian President Vladimir Putin ahead of his inauguration for another six-year term. A Kremlin spokesman didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
“The terrorist attack…was actually a failure of the Russian special services,” Malyuk said.
The SBU said the plot would have involved a series of strikes on vehicles carrying Zelensky and the other targets. Once Russians received the coordinates, they would send a missile strike. Then, one of the men surveilling the targets would use an FPV drone to attack anyone left alive at the site of the explosion. Russians would send a second missile strike in what is called a double-tap attack to cover up the presence of the drone and ensure the assassination was fully executed.
The Ukrainian security agency published text messages, photos, an interview with one of the detained men and an intercepted phone call between him and what it called his FSB handler as evidence of the plot. In the call, the alleged FSB handler told the man he would receive at least $50,000 for the job.
The agency didn’t name the detained Ukrainian men. It said they were colonels in the Department of State Security.
The involvement of senior officers in the alleged plot highlights the persistent problem of collaborators and moles in Ukraine’s security services.
The SBU said it has uncovered more than 2,000 people who have committed treason since the war began, from providing Moscow with coordinates for military targets to attempting to track the movements of senior officials, including the president.
Ukrainian officials said Russia has been recruiting agents in the country en masse for decades, including within security and intelligence services, which were long rife with corruption and sympathizers with Moscow.
The latest alleged plot is the latest in what Ukrainian officials have said are a string of attempts on the life of Zelensky, the former comic actor who has become the frontman for Ukraine’s war effort.
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