Igor Kirillov: Who was ‘assassinated’ Russian general who helped deploy ‘barbaric’ weapons in Ukraine?
The head of Russia’s nuclear protection forces has been killed by a hidden bomb in Moscow.
Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov died in the street outside a block of flats about four miles (7km) southeast of the Kremlin.
The bomb was inside an electric scooter and was triggered remotely. It had the power equivalent to roughly 300g of TNT, Russian state news agency Tass reported, citing unnamed sources in the emergency services.
Lt Gen Kirillov’s assistant was also killed in the blast.
Kyiv ‘claims it killed senior Russian general’ – follow live
A source from Ukraine’s security services (SBU) told the Reuters news agency it was responsible for the killing. The source said Kyiv regarded the high-ranking official as a war criminal and an “absolutely legitimate target”.
Sky News has not independently verified these claims.
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Russian general killed in Moscow
Who was Igor Kirillov?
Lt Gen Kirillov had been the head of Russia’s nuclear protection forces since 2017 – a branch of the Russian army that included radiological, chemical and biological weapons.
The 54-year-old was born on 13 July 1970 in Kostroma.
He went on to attend Kostroma Higher Military Command School of Chemical Defence, graduating in 2007.
During his time there, between 1991 and 1995, he served as a platoon commander in the Western Group of Forces in Germany and the Moscow Military District.
After graduating, he occupied various posts in Russia’s nuclear, biological and chemical defence forces, eventually becoming chief in 2017.
He was married and had two sons.
Link to nuclear weapons
The high-ranking Russian general led Russia’s Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops.
According to the Russian defence ministry website, the force’s main tasks involve identifying hazards and protecting units from contamination.
Another listed task of the group is “causing loss to the enemy by using flame-incendiary means”.
The scene of the explosion in Moscow.
Pic: Reuters/Maxim Shemetov
Throughout his military career, Lt Gen Kirillov was known for helping to develop the TOS-2 Tosochka heavy flamethrower system.
Although not a nuclear weapon, the TOS-2 is designed to destroy buildings, bunkers, and field fortifications as well as light-armoured vehicles and motor vehicles of the enemy, according to the Russian defence ministry.
Why was he a target?
Ukraine’s intelligence service said Lt Gen Kirillov was responsible for “the massive use of banned chemical weapons” against the Ukrainian military.
According to the SBU there have been more than 4,800 uses of chemical weapons on the battlefield since February 2022, particularly K-1 combat grenades, “by order of Kirillov”.
The scooter that exploded, killing the Russian general
In May, the US State Department said it had recorded the use of chloropicrin – a chemical weapon first used in the First World War – against Ukrainian troops.
On Monday, Lt Gen Kirillov was sentenced in absentia by the SBU for the use of banned chemical weapons.
The service said more than 2,000 Ukrainian troops had suffered varying degrees of chemical poisoning since the start of the full-scale invasion.
“According to the investigation, the occupiers use dangerous chemicals mainly in the hottest areas of combat, where they try to hide the use of chemical agents under dense artillery fire,” the SBU said.
Russia has always denied using any chemical weapons in Ukraine and, in turn, has accused Kyiv of using toxic agents in combat.
Why was he sanctioned in the UK?
Lt Gen Kirillov was sanctioned by the UK government back in October for using “hazardous chemical weapons on the battlefield”.
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Are Russian sanctions working?
In a statement at the time, the UK government said Russian forces had openly admitted to the “widespread use of riot control agents and multiple reports of the use of the toxic choking agent chloropicrin”.
It said Kirillov was “responsible for helping deploy these barbaric weapons” and had also been “a significant mouthpiece for Kremlin disinformation, spreading lies to mask Russia’s shameful and dangerous behaviour”.
Read more:
Killing of Russian general Igor Kirillov will ring alarm bells
Zelenskyy and Putin ‘gotta make a deal’, Trump says
Other hits on Russia soil
Moscow has accused Ukraine of a string of high-profile assassinations on its soil, designed to weaken morale and punish those Kyiv says are guilty of war crimes.
Ukraine, which says Russia’s war against it poses an existential threat to the Ukrainian state, has made clear that it regards such targeted killings as a legitimate tool.
On 9 December – just over a week before Lt Gen Kirillov was killed – an explosive device was placed under a car in the Russian-occupied Ukrainian city of Donetsk.
The device killed and was reportedly targeting Sergei Yevsyukov, the head of the Olenivka Prison, where dozens of Ukrainian prisoners of war died in a missile strike in July 2022.
One other person was injured in the blast.
Russia’s Federal Security Service said at the end of last week that a suspect had been arrested and charged with detonating the device.
Other suspected targets include:
Darya Dugina, a Russian TV commentator and the daughter of Kremlin-linked nationalist ideologue Alexander Dugin, died in a 2022 car bombing that investigators suspected was aimed at her father.
Vladlen Tatarsky, a popular military blogger, died in April 2023, when a statuette given to him at a party in St Petersburg exploded.
A Russian woman, who claimed that she presented the figurine on orders of a contact in Ukraine, was convicted in the case and jailed for 27 years.
Illia Kiva, a former pro-Moscow Ukrainian lawmaker who fled to Russia, was shot and killed near Moscow in December 2023.
The Ukrainian military intelligence at the time lauded the killing, warning that other “traitors of Ukraine” would share the same fate.
World
Trump criticises Putin after potentially ‘historic’ meeting with Zelenskyy before Pope’s funeral
Donald Trump has criticised Vladimir Putin and suggested a shift in his stance towards the Russian president after a meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy before the Pope’s funeral.
The Ukrainian president said the one-on-one talks could prove to be “historic” after pictures showed him sitting opposite Mr Trump, around two feet apart, in the large marble hall inside St Peter’s Basilica.
The US president said he doubted his Russian counterpart’s willingness to end the war after leaving Rome after the funeral of Pope Francis at the Vatican.
Follow live updates: 200,000 mourn at Vatican
In a post on his Truth Social platform, he said “there was no reason” for the Russian president “to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, cities and towns, over the last few days”.
The two leaders held talks before attending the Pope’s funeral
He added: “It makes me think that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war, he’s just tapping me along, and has to be dealt with differently, through ‘Banking’ or ‘Secondary Sanctions?’ Too many people are dying!!!”
The meeting between the US and Ukrainian leaders was their first face-to-face encounter since a very public row in the Oval Office in February.
Mr Zelenskyy said he had a good meeting with Mr Trump in which they talked about the defence of the Ukrainian people, a full and unconditional ceasefire, and a durable and lasting peace that would prevent the war restarting.
Other images released by the Ukrainian president’s office show Sir Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron were present for part of the talks, which were described as “positive” by the French presidency.
Mr Zelenskyy‘s spokesman said the meeting lasted for around 15 minutes and he and Mr Trump had agreed to hold further discussions later on Saturday.
The world leaders shared a moment before the service
Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy meet in the Basilica
But the US president left Rome for Washington on Air Force One soon after the funeral without any other talks having taken place.
The Ukrainian president’s office said there was no second meeting in Rome because of the tight schedule of both leaders, although he had separate discussions with Mr Starmer and Mr Macron.
The French president said in a post on X “Ukraine is ready for an unconditional ceasefire” and that a so-called coalition of the willing, led by the UK and France, would continue working to achieve a lasting peace.
There was applause from some of the other world leaders in attendance at the Vatican when Mr Zelenskyy walked out of St Peter’s Basilica after stopping in front of the pontiff’s coffin to pay his respects.
Donald Trump and the Ukrainian president met for the first time since their Oval Office row. Pic: Reuters
Sir Tony Brenton, the former British ambassador to Russia, said the event presents diplomatic opportunities, including the “biggest possible meeting” between Mr Trump and the Ukrainian leader.
He told Sky News it could mark “an important step” in starting the peace process between Russia and Ukraine.
Professor Father Francesco Giordano told Sky News the meeting is being called “Pope Francis’s miracle” by members of the clergy, adding: “There’s so many things that happened today – it was just overwhelming.”
The bilateral meeting comes after Mr Trump’s peace negotiator Steve Witkoff held talks with Mr Putin at the Kremlin.
They discussed “the possibility of resuming direct negotiations between Russia and Ukraine”, Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said.
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Russia and Ukraine have not held direct talks since the early weeks of the war, which began in February 2022.
Mr Trump has claimed a deal to end the war is “very close” and has urged Mr Zelenskyy to “get it done” in a post on his Truth Social platform.
He has previously warned both sides his administration would walk away from its efforts to achieve a peace if the two sides do not agree a deal soon.
Meanwhile, the Polish armed forces said a Russian military helicopter violated its airspace over the Baltic Sea on Friday evening.
“The nature of the incident indicates that Russia is testing the readiness of our air defence systems,” they said in a post on X.
On an extraordinary day, remarkable pictures on the margins that capture what may be a turning point for the world.
In a corner of St Peter’s Basilica before the funeral of Pope Francis, the leaders of America and Ukraine sit facing each other in two solitary chairs.
They look like confessor and sinner except we cannot tell which one is which.
Leaning forward hands together in their laps, Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy stare at each other in one photo.
In another, the Ukrainian president seems to be remonstrating with the US president. This is their first encounter since their infamous bust-up in the Oval Office.
The two leaders held talks before attending the Pope’s funeral
Other pictures show the moment their French and British counterparts introduced the two men. There is a palpable sense of nervousness in the way the leaders engage.
We do not know what the two presidents said in their brief meeting.
But in the mind of the Ukrainian leader will be the knowledge President Trump has this week said America will reward Russia for its unprovoked brutal invasion of his country, under any peace deal.
Mr Trump has presented Ukraine and Russia with a proposal and ultimatum so one-sided it could have been written in the Kremlin.
Kyiv must surrender the land Russia has taken by force, Crimea forever, the rest at least for now. And it must submit to an act of extortion, a proposed deal that would hand over half its mineral wealth effectively to America.
The world leaders shared a moment before the service
Afterwards, Zelenskyy said it had been a good meeting that could turn out to be historic “if we reach results together”.
They had talked, he said, about the defence of Ukraine, a full and unconditional ceasefire and a durable and lasting peace that will prevent a war restarting.
The Trump peace proposal includes only unspecified security guarantees for Ukraine from countries that do not include the US. It rules out any membership of Ukraine.
Ukraine’s allies are watching closely to see if Mr Trump will apply any pressure on Vladimir Putin, let alone punish him for recent bloody attacks on Ukraine.
Or will he simply walk away if the proposal fails, blaming Ukrainian intransigence, however outrageously, before moving onto a rapprochement with Moscow.
If he does, America’s role as guarantor of international security will be seen effectively as over.
This could be the week we see the world order as we have known it since the end of the Second World War buried, as well as a pope.
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