A car bomb has killed a senior General Staff member, officials have confirmed. The Investigative Committee reported that Lt. Gen. Fanil Sarvarov, head of operational training at the Russian General Staff, was killed in a car bomb blast in Moscow on Monday morning.
According to the report, an explosive device had been planted beneath the vehicle he was traveling in and detonated in the southern part of the Russian capital. The blast also damaged several other vehicles and seriously injured Sarvarov’s driver.
Russian officials identified one line of investigation as an assassination carried out by Ukrainian intelligence services. They noted that Kyiv has previously used explosive devices in targeted killings of officials and public figures.
Last December, a bomb hidden in an e-scooter killed Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, commander of Russia’s Nuclear, Chemical, and Biological Defense Forces, and his aide, which investigators alleged was a Ukrainian plot.
Sarvarov, a career officer with combat experience gained during counterterrorism actions in southern Russia in the late 1990s and early 2000s, was appointed in 2016 to lead the department responsible for training senior officers at staff exercises and other events. Previously, he was involved in the Russian deployment in Syria.
