The events of the ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia were complicated on Tuesday, after a Ukrainian special operation led to the assassination of the commander of the Radiological, Chemical and Biological Defense Forces in the Russian army.
On Tuesday, the Ukrainian Security Services claimed responsibility for the assassination of a senior official in the Russian army, with an explosion in Moscow.
The commander of the Russian army’s radiological, chemical and Biological Defense Forces, Igor Kirillov, as well as another military man, were killed by an explosion in Moscow on Tuesday morning, according to Russian media.
And Igor Kirillov is a prominent figure in the Kremlin, he heads the agency of radiological, chemical and Biological Defense Forces, better known as RKhBZ. He commanded the special forces operating under the conditions of radioactive, chemical and biological contamination and tasked with protecting the ground forces operating in extreme conditions.
The security service of Ukraine said that a day before the attack, Ukrainian prosecutors sentenced him in absentia for the alleged use of chemical weapons banned in Ukraine.
The State Security Agency of Ukraine claimed that”on Kirillov’s orders, since the beginning of the large-scale war, more than 4,800 cases of enemy use of chemical munitions have been recorded”.
Britain had imposed sanctions on the Russian official in October, along with the nuclear protection forces for their use of riot control agents and multiple reports of the use of the toxic asphyxiating agent chloropicrin on the battlefield.
The Investigative Committee of Russia said that Kirilov and his assistant were killed after “detonating an explosive device planted in an electric scooter parked near the entrance to an apartment building on the morning of December 17 on Ryazansky Prospekt in Moscow, “about 7 kilometers southeast of the Kremlin.
The explosion shattered several windows in the building and caused serious damage to the front door, an AFP correspondent at the scene reported.
The state-run RIA Novosti news agency, citing a source, reported that the power of the explosive device is equivalent to 200 grams of explosive TNT.
Experts suggest that the assassination of the prominent figure may be a new strategy of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, to eliminate any hopes of reaching a settlement with Russia.
Zelensky’s fears are that US President-elect Donald Trump will begin to put pressure on Ukraine to reach some kind of agreement with Russia, which he promised earlier, to end the war.
The assassination strategy may be Zelensky’s last attempt to inflame the situation with Russia, move away from a compromise solution, and push the west to continue supporting him in the war with Russia.
