June 23 (UPI) — Particulars of two separate assassination plots in opposition to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky final yr had been described Monday by the pinnacle of Ukraine’s safety service.
Two colonels assigned to guard Zelensky had been working for the Russian FSB and plotting to assassinate him, the pinnacle of Ukraine’s safety service, Lt. Gen. Vasyl Malyuk, informed journalists.
He additionally described assassination plans in Rzeszow, Poland, on the airport.
Some info from each incidents was disclosed final yr, together with the one by the colonels.
“Final yr, we carried out a serious operation,” Malyuk stated. “A kind of detained was the pinnacle of a division inside UDO — somebody whose function is to guard this nation’s management. Alongside him, one other colonel was arrested. Each had been working for Russia’s FSB, particularly its Fifth Service.”
Fifth Service is part of Russia’s federal safety service.
Malyuk stated the plan was to determine and recruit individuals to assassinate Zelensky on the President’s Workplace in Kyiv.
“This was an especially complicated operation on our half. We labored on it for almost two years, primarily from the start of the full-scale invasion. We managed to infiltrate the group utilizing a strong agent-technical operation,” Malyuk stated.
In Could 2024, Zelensky dismissed the pinnacle of the unit. Serhiy Rud had been in his job since 2019 and beforehand led the president’s private safety unit.
A Polish navy veteran, who “was recruited many years in the past and firmly believed within the Soviet trigger” deliberate the operation on the airport, in line with UNIAN information company in a report by Notes from Poland.
UNIAN solely recognized him as Paweł Okay. in accordance with Polish privateness legal guidelines. He thought-about a number of methods to assassinate the Ukrainian president, together with utilizing a drone or a sniper, Malyuk stated.
SBU and Poland Inside Safety Company uncovered the plans. He was taken into custody in Poland.
Poland’s inside minister, Tomasz Siemoniak, later Monday clarified that it was an incident publicly disclosed in April 2024.
Rzeszow is the primary hub for officers touring out and in of Ukraine.
Siemoniak’s spokesman, Jacek Dobrzynski confirmed the suspect was indicted for the crime of “declaring readiness to behave for the good thing about a overseas intelligence service in opposition to the Republic of Poland.” It carries a jail sentence of as much as eight years.
