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US says not involved in killing of Russian general
"I can tell you that the United States was not aware of it in advance and was not involved," State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said of the killing of Igor Kirillov, the head of the Russian army's chemical weapons division.
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In this grab from a handout footage released by the Russian Defence Ministry on October 24, 2022, Russia's Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, in charge of Russian troops for radioactive, chemical and biological protection, speaks at a briefing in Moscow. (AFP/Handout)
T
he United States said Tuesday it was not involved in the killing of a senior Russian army officer in an operation claimed by Ukraine, but denounced his "atrocities."
"I can tell you that the United States was not aware of it in advance and was not involved," State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said of the killing of Igor Kirillov, the head of the Russian army's chemical weapons division.
But Miller pointed to earlier US assessments that Kirillov -- the senior-most Russian military figure assassinated since Moscow invaded Ukraine -- had ordered the use of riot control agents on the battlefield in violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention.
"He was a general who was involved in a number of atrocities. He was involved in the use of chemical weapons against (the) Ukrainian military," Miller said.
Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova accused Ukraine's Western allies of being "accomplices" to the brazen assassination in Moscow.
A US official, speaking earlier on condition of anonymity, said that the United States "was not aware of the operation in advance and we do not support or enable these kinds of activities."
Kirillov, who was chief of Russia's Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops, was killed outside an apartment building along with his assistant when a bomb hidden in an electric scooter went off, Russia's Investigative Committee, which probes serious crimes, said.
A Ukraine's intelligence service SBU source confirmed to Reuters that the Ukrainian intelligence agency had been behind the hit. "The liquidation of the chief of the radiation and chemical protection troops of the Russian Federation is the work of the SBU," the source said.
The source said that a scooter containing explosives was detonated, killing both Kirillov and his aide, as they stepped out of a building on Ryazansky Prospekt in Moscow.
Unverified video footage of the attack circulating on social media showed two men exiting the building to get into a car followed by a large explosion as the two men remained on the pavement. Reuters could not independently verify the footage.
Former President Dmitry Medvedev, now a senior Russian security official, told a meeting shown on state TV that Moscow would avenge what he called an act of terrorism.
"Law enforcement agencies must find the killers in Russia," said Medvedev. "Everything must be done to destroy the masterminds (of the killing) who are in Kyiv. We know who these masterminds are. They are the military and political leadership of Ukraine," he said.
