Ukraine claims it foiled Russian plot to kill Zelensky

The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) announced on Monday that it had arrested a woman who had passed intelligence to the Russians about the location of President Vladimir Zelensky, so they could try and kill him.

The suspect is a resident of the port city of Ochakov, in Nikolaev Region, who used to work at a military supply store as a sales clerk, according to the authorities. The SBU said they caught her “red handed” while passing intelligence to the “invaders.”

The woman, who has not been named, allegedly inquired about Zelensky’s schedule and route ahead of his visit to Nikolaev in June. The SBU detected her and implemented additional security measures to protect the president, while deploying agents to gather more evidence on the suspected “Russian informant.”

Ukraine’s security service alleges the woman also sought to identify the location of electronic warfare systems and ammunition warehouses in the Ochakov area, so that the Russians could target them in a “massive air strike.” She allegedly traveled around the district and photographed the location of Ukrainian Armed Forces objects, while also secretly inquiring about them in the “social institutions” of the region.

SBU’s announcement comes just a week after Politico published a feature about Kiev’s contingency plans in case Zelensky was assassinated, which the outlet claimed he narrowly avoided on several occasions. 

Politico even named the circle of people who would take over for the former actor, with speaker of the parliament Ruslan Stefanchuk acting as the figurehead, Zelensky’s producer and chief of staff Andrey Ermak running the daily operations, and the triumvirate of Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba Defense Minister Aleksey Reznikov and General Valery Zaluzhny managing the war.

The SBU has been on a hunt for enemies of Ukraine from the moment hostilities with Russia escalated in February 2022. The very next month, they summarily executed a businessman who had been working for Ukraine’s military intelligence to sabotage talks with Russia – which Kiev admitted only a year later. 

More recently, the SBU raided hundreds of homes and offices in Kiev and 11 regions of Ukraine in pursuit of what they called a widespread conspiracy to sell fraudulent medical mobilization exemptions for $6,000 apiece.

Although the SBU claimed the “Russian informant” directly threatened Zelensky’s life, the Ochakov resident was charged with unauthorized dissemination of information about the movements of troops and equipment, with the maximum penalty of up to 12 years in prison if convicted.