Ukraine says two agents working in Russia have been killed after a senior Ukrainian intelligence officer was shot dead on Thursday.
Kol Ivan Volonich was shot several times in the daytime Kiev parking lot after approaching an unidentified assailant who fled the scene.
Vasyl Malyuk, head of Ukraine’s Security Services (SBU), said in a video statement that two agents working for the Russian Security Services FSB were tracked and “liquidated” after resisting arrest on Sunday morning.
Separately, the Ukrainian national police said the agents were “foreign citizens” without further details. There was no immediate response from Moscow.
CCTV footage of the July 10 incident – verified by news agency Reuters – showed another man leaving the building in Kiev’s Holosi-Ivsky district shortly after 9:00 local time (06:00 GMT) that another man ran towards him.
The SBU said on Sunday that the suspect was following Kol Volonich’s movements before the attack and was sent out the coordinates of the hiding location where he found a silenced pistol.
After he was shot, they said they “trying to lie down low but found after a joint investigation with the National Police Department.
SBU focuses primarily on internal security and anti-intellectuality like the UK MI5. However, since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 in Moscow, it has played a prominent role in obstructive attacks and assassinations deep within Russia.
A source within Ukrainian security services told the BBC that the SBU was responsible for the murder of high-ranking Russian general Igor Kirillov in December 2024.
In April, General Jaroslav Moskarik was killed in a car bomb attack in Moscow. The Kremlin denounced Kiev.
Ukrainian security services have never officially admitted liability for death.
This week’s death comes after Russia’s strike in Ukraine reaches record levels.
On Tuesday, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine faced the biggest Russian air attack ever. In June, Ukraine recorded its highest monthly civilian casualties in three years.
The battle continues at the forefront, with Russian troops slowly gaining profits in eastern Ukraine, seizing control of most of the Russian Kursk region, which Kiev’s troops seized in shock attacks last summer.
Over three years of war have waned efforts to negotiate a ceasefire.
