“The FSB thwarted an attack on one of Russia’s highest-ranking officials, which was planned to be carried out by detonating a bomb while he was visiting the grave of his closest relatives in the Troyekurovskoye Cemetery,” the press release stated, although it did not specify the official’s identity.
The security agency’s statement emphasized that a hidden video camera had been prepared in a vase of flowers to carry out the terrorist act. Agents arrested three accomplices in the planning of the attack: two Russians and an immigrant from a Central Asian country.
The FSB report also noted that to prepare the official’s assassination, Ukrainian special services used an illegal immigrant recruited in the Central Asian region and two Russian citizens with criminal records and drug addictions, arrested in Moscow.
FSB agents seized communication devices containing correspondence among the detainees and an employee of the Ukrainian special services on messaging apps like WhatsApp and Signal, confirming the planning of the attack.
jdt/iff/otf/gfa
