Russia detains suspect in car bomb attack that killed general

Russian security forces say they have detained a Ukrainian spy accused of killing a senior Russian general in a car bomb attack in Moscow’s suburbs on Friday.

The FSB secret service said they had apprehended “Ukrainian special services agent Ignat Kuzi” who had “planted explosives in a Volkswagen Golf” to kill Gen Yaroslav Moskalik.

Gen Moskalik had been the deputy head of the main operational directorate of the military’s General Staff. He died after walking past the car parked outside his house in the suburb of Balashikha.

The FSB said Kuzin had rigged the car with a homemade explosive device and the bomb had then been set off remotely from Ukraine.

Ukraine has not commented on the bombing.

The FSB said the suspect had been recruited by Ukraine in 2023, and had driven to Moscow in September that year.

Russian media also reported that the FSB had released a video showing the detained man giving an apparent confession, as well as footage of his arrest and of the bomb’s components.

The Kremlin had on Friday blamed Ukraine for the attack, saying Kyiv “continues its involvement in terrorist activities inside our country”.

Gen Moskalik had represented Russia in talks with Ukraine in Paris in 2015, which resulted in the failed Minsk agreements which aimed to end the fighting in the Donbas region between Ukraine and Russian-backed separatist forces that started in 2014.

Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.