Information of Kuzminov’s violent demise emerged simply days after the sudden dying in jail of Russian political opposition chief Alexei Navalny, which European and U.S. officers have framed as proof of the Russian authorities’s unchecked brutality.
The spokesman for Ukraine’s intelligence service, Andriy Yusov, confirmed to The Washington Submit on Tuesday that the physique discovered on the entrance to a residential advanced in Villajoyosa, in Alicante, was Kuzminov’s.
Russian officers haven’t claimed accountability for the killing. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov declined to touch upon the case Tuesday, saying it was “not on the Kremlin’s agenda.”
However Sergei Naryshkin, the top of Russia’s overseas intelligence service, spoke to Russian journalists Tuesday, saying that Kuzminov was lifeless the second he began planning his defection.
“In Russia, it is not uncommon to talk effectively of the lifeless or say nothing in any respect. This traitor and legal already grew to become an ethical corpse for the time being when he was planning his soiled and horrible crime,” Naryshkin stated, in line with experiences in Russian state information businesses Tass and Ria.
In October, Dmitry Kiselyov, host of the state tv information program “Vesti Nedeli,” aired a phase on Kuzminov’s defection. The report ended by quoting three masked males in camouflage, recognized as particular forces members of Russian army intelligence, stating that they’d been given the order to remove Kuzminov.
“We are going to discover the person and punish him to the complete extent of the regulation of our state for treason,” stated one. “We now have lengthy arms.”
“He is not going to dwell to see the trial,” stated one other.
Russian propagandists celebrated the pilot’s reported dying Tuesday.
Professional-Kremlin blogger Sergei Markov posted on Telegram that Kuzminov was “eradicated.”
“We is not going to rejoice in anybody’s dying. However this information can save many lives, as a result of it reminds everybody: Save your lives and by no means cooperate with the Ukrainian neo-fascist regime in something,” he stated.
Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s Nationwide Safety and Protection Council, warned that the killing of Kuzminov might embolden Russians to take extra such actions.
“If the Russians really feel so empowered throughout the European Union that they begin killing individuals, the query turns into fairly advanced. This isn’t the primary occasion the place Russians behave this manner,” he advised Ukrainska Pravda newspaper late Monday.
Because of probably the most brazen instances in Europe, Russian agent Vadim Krasikov is serving life imprisonment in Germany for fatally capturing former Chechen insurgent Zelimkhan Khangoshvili in Berlin’s Kleiner Tiergarten park in 2019. German prosecutors stated throughout his trial that Krasikov in all probability acted on the orders of Russian state safety companies.
The Kremlin has repeatedly denied involvement, however Russian President Vladimir Putin appeared to undercut these denials with an indirect remark in his interview this month with former Fox Information host Tucker Carlson.
Putin steered that he may be open to a swap involving the discharge of Evan Gershkovich — a Wall Road Journal correspondent being held on spying fees that he and the State Division vehemently deny — in change for “an individual serving a sentence in a rustic allied to the U.S.”
Putin described Krasikov as “an individual who, attributable to patriotic sentiments, eradicated a bandit in one of many European capitals.”
“Whether or not he did it of his personal volition or not, that may be a completely different query,” Putin added.
British authorities additionally blamed Russian safety companies for the deadly poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko, a former Federal Safety Service officer and Putin critic, in London in 2006, and once more when former Russian intelligence agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia had been poisoned in Salisbury, England, in 2018. The Skripals survived, however a British citizen, Daybreak Sturgess, died after dealing with the discarded fragrance bottle that contained the nerve agent.
Spain’s Inside Ministry on Tuesday wouldn’t affirm the id of the physique present in Villajoyosa. Investigators had initially believed the one that died was a Ukrainian by a distinct identify.
“In the middle of the investigation that’s being carried out, it has come to our consideration that the id of this particular person could possibly be false and could possibly be that of one other particular person. The Guardia Civil is continuing to confirm this, however we’re unable to offer any additional data at the moment,” the ministry stated in an announcement.
Spanish media cited sources contained in the Guardia Civil confirming that the physique was Kuzminov’s. Witnesses advised native media that gunmen shot him a number of instances, then ran him over and escaped in a automotive.
Ukraine introduced with nice fanfare in August an intelligence operation that persuaded Kuzminov to fly his Mi-8 helicopter loaded with jet components into Ukraine to defect. The 2 crew members with him had been unaware of the plot and had been shot by Ukrainian forces after they refused to give up, in line with officers.
The Ukrainian authorities later introduced that the pilot had obtained a $500,000 reward in native foreign money and inspired different Russian service members to observe swimsuit.
Kuzminov recounted how his defection took place in a September interview revealed by Ukraine’s Protection Intelligence.
“I contacted representatives of Ukrainian intelligence, defined my state of affairs, to which they provided this feature: ‘Come on, we assure your security, assure new paperwork, assure financial compensation, a reward,’” he stated.
Paul Schemm in London contributed to this report.