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LAST UPDATE | 9 mins ago
A TOP RUSSIAN military intelligence general has been hospitalised after he was shot several times in an apartment building in Moscow.
Russia’s Investigative Committee said an unidentified individual “fired several shots” at Vladimir Alekseyev, the deputy head of Moscow’s GRU military intelligence, before fleeing the scene.
It did not say anything about the suspected perpetrator.
“Investigative actions and operational search measures are being carried out to identify the person or persons involved in committing the aforementioned crime,” spokesperson Svetlana Petrenko said in a statement.
In televised comments, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accused Ukraine of being behind the “terrorist act”, accusing Kyiv of trying to “disrupt the negotiation process” searching for an end to the four-year war.
The Kremlin said its secret services were investigating the incident and keeping President Vladimir Putin informed.
“The special services are doing their job,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
“We wish the general a speedy recovery. We hope that will be the case.”
In a northwestern Moscow suburb, a forensic truck was parked outside an apartment block and investigators had cordoned off access.
A career military officer, Alekseyev has been the first deputy chief of the GRU since 2011.
He was sanctioned by the US for his alleged role in organising cyberattacks as part of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
He was also sanctioned by the EU for orchestrating the Novichok poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Britain in 2018.
That attempted assassination left one person dead and severely strained ties between London and Moscow.
Alekseyev also led intelligence operations during the Russian intervention in Syria on behalf of now-ousted leader Bashar al-Assad.
A year after Russia invaded Ukraine, he was despatched to negotiate with Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin during his attempted mutiny against Russian military top brass in 2023.
At the time Alekseyev was filmed sitting with Prigozhin in a Russian military compound taken over by Wagner, trying to convince the mercenary chief to call off his troops.
Prigozhin died months after the aborted rebellion when his plane exploded mid-air.
Several high-ranking military officials have been killed since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Kyiv has claimed responsibility for some of the hits.
Last month, a Russian court sentenced an Uzbek man to life in prison for the 2024 killing of the head of the Russian army’s radiological, chemical and biological defence forces.
The general, Igor Kirillov, was killed when a booby-trapped scooter exploded as he left an apartment block in Moscow, in an attack Kyiv said it had orchestrated.
With reporting from © AFP 2026
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