Russia says it thwarts Ukrainian plots to kill high-ranking officers and their families By Reuters

MOSCOW, Reuters – Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said on Thursday it had foiled several plots by Ukrainian intelligence services to kill senior Russian officers and their families in Moscow using bombs disguised as power banks or file folders.

Ukraine’s SBU intelligence service killed Lieutenant General Kirillov, head of Russia’s nuclear, biological and chemical defense forces, on December 17 outside his apartment building in Moscow by detonating a bomb attached to an electric scooter.

An SBU source confirmed to Reuters that Ukraine’s intelligence agency was behind the attack.Russia called the killing an act of terrorism by Kiev and vowed to retaliate.

“The Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation has prevented a number of assassination attempts against high-ranking military personnel of the Ministry of Defense,” the FSB said.

“Four Russian citizens were arrested, who were involved in the preparation of these attacks.”

The FSB, the main successor to the Soviet-era KGB, has announced that Russian citizens were recruited by Ukrainian intelligence services.

One of the men seized a bomb disguised as a power bank in Moscow, which was supposed to be attached with magnets to the car of one of the high-ranking officials of the Ministry of Defense, reports FSS.

Another Russian man was tasked with spying on senior Russian defense officials.One of the plots involved the delivery of a bomb disguised as a file folder, the FSB said.