The counterintelligence division of the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) has apprehended an FSB agent who attempted to assassinate an official from the Melitopol City Council in the Zaporizhzhia region.
Following instructions from the Russian special service, the assassin ambushed the official in the entrance of a residential building and struck him multiple times on the head with a hammer. Despite sustaining numerous injuries, the victim survived.
To maintain secrecy, the assailant posed as a utility worker conducting technical work in the apartment building where the official lived.
After committing the crime, the perpetrator was preparing to flee to the occupied area of Zaporizhzhia through EU territory, planning to use one of the “schemes for evaders” to cross the state border.
SSU officers quickly located the hired killer and arrested him during his escape attempt.
The suspect was a repeat offender residing in occupied Melitopol, having come to the attention of the Russian forces while serving a sentence in a Russian prison for intentional murder before the full-scale invasion.
In June 2024, he was fully recruited and sent to a special training course at an FSB training center in the temporarily occupied part of the region. There, under the supervision of Russian special service instructors, the agent underwent firearms training, knife fighting techniques, and learned methods of concealment.
To carry out his mission, the killer arrived in Zaporizhzhia posing as a displaced person. After arriving in the city, he began tracking the victim’s work and residence addresses, as well as their main routes of movement.
To cover his tracks, the agent constantly changed the addresses of his rented accommodations and communicated with his Russian handler using fictional nicknames in an anonymous chat messenger.
In exchange for killing the Ukrainian official, the Russians promised to transfer a house in Melitopol, previously owned by local residents who had been forced to leave due to occupation, to their accomplice.
The suspect is currently in custody and faces life imprisonment with confiscation of property.
