- Category
- Latest news
Ukrainian Security Service Foils Russian Assassin Plot, Detains Operatives Planning Targeted Killings
- Authors
![Photo of Dariia Mykhailenko]( "Photo of Dariia Mykhailenko")
The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has successfully dismantled a Russian military intelligence agent network, preventing a series of planned high-profile assassinations in Ukraine, the SBU reported on March 24.
According to the SBU, the operation resulted in the neutralization of a Russian assassin who attempted to resist arrest and was subsequently killed. In addition, over 10 other members of the agent network were detained.
We bring you stories from the ground. Your support keeps our team in the field.
The operation involved military counterintelligence, the SBU's main investigative office, special forces, and SBU personnel from the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. The targeted individuals had been preparing to carry out the assassinations of prominent Ukrainian figures in different regions of the country.
“The assassins were tracking the locations and movement routes of military and public figures and subsequently sent the collected data to their network leader, the resident,” the SBU stated. “The head of the group was a Russian agent who had been recruited from the city of Poltava and was tasked with compiling and reporting the intelligence to Russian authorities.”
The SBU further revealed that the operatives were planning to use improvised explosive devices and would have placed them under the vehicles or near the homes of their intended targets. If the explosives failed to detonate, the assassin was instructed to shoot the victims at close range.
One of the targeted individuals, Ukrainian Defense Ministry adviser and volunteer Serhiy Sternenko, along with Illya Bohdanov, a Russian national who has been fighting for Ukraine since 2014, was reportedly in the hit list.
The Russian assailant, who was trained at a GRU base in the temporarily occupied Donetsk region, had been smuggled into Ukrainian-controlled territory. During searches of the suspect’s locations, law enforcement officers seized firearms, ammunition, voice recorders, computer equipment, and surveillance cameras containing evidence of their collaboration with Russian intelligence.
Just a day earlier, on March 23, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) revealed the identification of a Hungarian military intelligence officer accused of coordinating a spy network uncovered in the Zakarpattia region in spring 2025, according to an official statement.
SBU counterintelligence officers reported that the network was led by Zoltan Andre, a staff member of Hungary's military intelligence. Andre is said to have supervised a group of agents tasked with gathering critical information on the region's military defenses, social and political sentiments, and the potential response of the local population in the event of a Hungarian military deployment.
-457ad7ae19a951ebdca94e9b6bf6309d.png)
