A senior officer of Ukraine’s domestic intelligence agency has been fatally shot in broad daylight in the capital, Kyiv, authorities confirmed.
The agent, believed to be working with the Security Service of Ukraine, was gunned down multiple times in a parking lot by an unknown attacker, who quickly fled the scene.
The incident, which was captured on surveillance video circulating online, has raised serious security concerns.
While the SBU has not officially named the victim, Ukrainian media outlets have identified him as Colonel Ivan Voronych.
Ukraine’s SBU, comparable to the UK’s MI5, is tasked with safeguarding internal security and counter-intelligence.
However, since the onset of Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, the agency has also been linked to covert missions deep inside Russian territory, including sabotage operations and high-profile assassinations.
Sources from Ukraine’s security services previously disclosed to media outlets, including the BBC, that they orchestrated the December 2024 assassination of Russian General Igor Kirillov.
Similarly, earlier this year, Russian General Yaroslav Moskalik was killed in a car bomb explosion in Moscow, an attack the Kremlin squarely blamed on Kyiv.
Ukrainian authorities have neither confirmed nor denied involvement in either killing.
Authorities in Kyiv have yet to establish a motive behind the latest killing. In a statement, the city’s police said officers arrived to find a man with fatal gunshot wounds.
“Measures are being taken to detain him,” the police added, referring to the unidentified shooter.
The SBU issued a statement of its own, saying it was conducting “a comprehensive set of measures to clarify all the circumstances of the crime and bring the perpetrators to justice.”
Verified CCTV footage released by Reuters shows a man wearing jeans and a dark T-shirt exiting a building in Kyiv’s southern Holosiivskyi district around 09:00 local time (06:00 GMT) on Thursday.
As he approaches a nearby car carrying a plastic bag and holdall, another individual is seen sprinting toward him.
According to Ukrainska Pravda, which cited unnamed sources, the gunman used a pistol to shoot the SBU officer five times.
The suspected targeted killing came just two days after what Ukrainian officials have called the largest Russian aerial assault to date.
On Tuesday, 728 drones and 13 cruise or ballistic missiles rained down on cities across Ukraine.
That was followed by another Russian strike early Thursday on Kyiv, which claimed the lives of at least two people and left 16 others wounded.
Officials reported that 18 missiles and 400 drones were launched, hitting eight different districts in the capital.
As the war grinds on, Russian forces continue to make slow gains in eastern Ukraine. They have also regained parts of Russia’s Kursk region that were briefly held by Ukrainian troops after a surprise offensive last summer.
Currently, Russia maintains control over roughly 20% of Ukrainian territory, including Crimea, which it annexed in 2014.
Efforts toward a negotiated ceasefire remain at a standstill, with U.S. President Donald Trump reportedly showing growing frustration with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
