Car Bomb Kills Russian General         12/22 06:12

   

   MOSCOW (AP) -- A car bomb killed a Russian general on Monday, the third such 
killing of a senior military officer in a year. Investigators said Ukraine may 
be behind the attack.

   Lt. Gen. Fanil Sarvarov, head of the Operational Training Directorate of the 
Russian Armed Forces' General Staff, died from his injuries, said Svetlana 
Petrenko, the spokesperson for Russia's Investigative Committee, the nation's 
top criminal investigation agency.

   "Investigators are pursuing numerous lines of inquiry regarding the murder. 
One of these is that the crime was orchestrated by Ukrainian intelligence 
services," Petrenko said.

   Since Moscow sent troops into Ukraine nearly four years ago, Russian 
authorities have blamed Ukraine for several assassinations of military officers 
and public figures in Russia. Ukraine has claimed responsibility for some of 
them. It has not yet commented on Monday's death.

   Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that President Vladimir Putin had been 
immediately informed about Sarvarov's killing.

   The Defense Ministry said that Sarvarov had previously fought in Chechnya 
and taken part in Moscow's military campaign in Syria.

   Just over a year ago, Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, the chief of the military's 
nuclear, biological and chemical protection forces, was killed by a bomb hidden 
on an electric scooter outside his apartment building. Kirillov's assistant 
also died. Ukraine's security service claimed responsibility for the attack.

   An Uzbek man was quickly arrested and charged with killing Kirillov on 
behalf of the Ukrainian security service.

   Putin described Kirillov's killing as a "major blunder" by Russia's security 
agencies, noting they should learn from it and improve their efficiency.

   In April, another senior Russian military officer, Lt. Gen. Yaroslav 
Moskalik, a deputy head of the main operational department in the General 
Staff, was killed by an explosive device placed in his car parked near his 
apartment building just outside Moscow. A suspected perpetrator was quickly 
arrested.

   Days after Moskalik's killing, Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said 
he received a report from the head of Ukraine's foreign intelligence agency on 
the "liquidation" of top Russian military figures, adding that "justice 
inevitably comes" although he didn't mention Moskalik's name.