MOSCOW, August 12. /TASS/. The agent recruited by the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s intelligence service has described how he selected places for planting bombs at the airport and bus station in Simferopol, Crimea’s capital.
The footage of Ridvan Sulemanov questioning was released by the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) on Friday.
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Sulemanov said he had arrived in Simferopol on July 29 and "visited the central bus station and airport and found four places for possible planting of explosive devices." He said he sent their descriptions to the man named Pavel Nikolayevich who had recruited him in the Ukrainian town of Zaporozhye in October 2015.
Sulemanov was detained on July 30 when he was taking pictures at Simferopol’s airport.
He said he was instructed by Pavel Nikolayevich "to go to Simferopol and find places for planting explosive devices" in crowded areas.
"I realize that I was looking for places for Ukrainian intelligence agents to plant bombs and carry out terrorist attacks, which could kill civilians," Sulemanov said.
Suspect Zakhtei confirms involvement in preparing terror acts in Crimea
Andrei Zakhtei suspected of preparing terror acts in Crimea has confirmed he acted on order from Ukraine’s military intelligence.
A video footage of Zakhtei’s questioning held by Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) was shown on Rossiya-24 TV Channel on Friday.
"Now I realize and assess my actions that I was directly fulfilling an order of Ukraine’s military intelligence on transporting saboteurs and their load across Crimea," he said.
According to Zakhtei, a man called him over the phone on August 6 and said he "was advised by Yuri."
"In a telephone talk, he told me that I needed to drive to the village of Risovoye near Armyansk at midnight, take a group of people with some load," the suspect said, noting that later that person had transferred the meeting to the village of Suvorovo to take four people there and "the cargo they arrived with."
"When driving up to the place [Suvorovo], I heard a firefight and was detained by FSB officers on the scene," the suspect said.
Russia’s Federal Security Service reported on August 10 that it had detained a group of saboteurs on the territory of Crimea and had also prevented terrorist acts on the peninsula prepared by the Main Intelligence Department of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry.
One FSB officer was killed during the operation to detain the terrorists. Later, a serviceman of Russia’s Defense Ministry was killed as the saboteurs made a second attempt of intrusion. The terrorist attacks were designed to target critical infrastructure and life support facilities of Crimea.
Twenty improvised explosive devices containing more than 40 kilograms of TNT equivalent, ammunition, fuses, antipersonnel and magnetic mines, grenades and the Ukrainian armed forces’ standard special weapons were found at the scene, the FSB said.
Ukraine’s President Poroshenko and the Foreign Ministry have rejected Moscow’s accusations, calling the alleged saboteurs’ detention a provocation.
Ukrainian President Poroshenko ordered on Thursday to put on full combat alert all units on the border with Crimea and on the contact line in Donbass.