MOSCOW, December 26. /TASS/. Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has foiled a series of assassination attempts on the lives of senior Russian defense officials in Moscow and their family members plotted by Ukrainian intelligence services, the FSB press office told TASS on Thursday.

"The Federal Security Service of Russia has foiled a series of assassination attempts plotted by agents of Ukrainian special services on the lives of high-ranking servicemen of the Russian Defense Ministry participating in the special military operation and also their family members," the press office said in a statement.

"As a result of measures carried out, four citizens of Russia complicit in plotting these assassination attempts have been detained," it said.

The bombs intended for killing high-placed Russian Defense Ministry officials were disguised as a power bank and a document folder, it specified.

Agent under guise of a deportee

As the FSB elaborated, "a Russian citizen permanently residing in Ukraine since 2020 and recruited by Ukrainian special services" arrived in Moscow from Ukraine in November 2024 ‘in transit via Moldova and Georgia" under the guise of a deportee to commit a terror attack.

"While staying on the territory of the Moscow Region, he retrieved an improvised explosive device and a video surveillance system from a cache. The explosive device camouflaged as a portable charger (a power bank) with attached magnets was intended to be planted under the service car of a high-placed Russian Defense Ministry official whose driver was his close relative," the press office said.

The Ukrainian intelligence services planned to detonate the bomb remotely from the territory of Ukraine. Apart from the supervisor from the Ukrainian special services, the preparations for the terrorist attack were also coordinated by the agent’s wife residing in Mirgorod in the Poltava Region of Ukraine, it said.

After the terror attack, the Ukrainian special services planned to ensure their agent’s departure for Ukraine and then to one of European Union countries, the FSB press office said.

Muscovite who gathered data on Russian Defense Ministry officials

The FSB has also identified a resident of Moscow recruited by Ukrainian special services who was gathering intelligence data at their instruction at the living and work places of high-ranking Russian Defense Ministry officials and their family members, it said.

"He sent photo and video materials to his supervisors for plotting terrorist attacks," the FSB press office said.

"A terrorist act was planned against one of the defense officials with the involvement of two citizens of Russia [both were also detained]. They were assigned with delivering him an improvised explosive device disguised as a document folder that they had retrieved from a cache in the Moscow Region using the coordinates they received from Ukrainian citizen Ragozha, Vitaly Nikolayevich, born in 1988, a native of Krasnodon in the Lugansk Region who was living in Poland and working for Ukraine’s intelligence services," it specified.

Explosives smuggled to Russia

The FSB seized improvised explosive devices and communications devices from the four detainees who had used them in their criminal activity, the press office said.

"The enemy’s special services delivered components of explosive devices to our country in electrical household appliances, tools and auto parts," it said.

The FSB Investigative Department for Moscow and the Moscow Region has launched criminal probes. Depending on their role, the detainees will face criminal liability for the trafficking of explosives and explosive devices and the plotting of terrorist acts, and also for high treason that is punishable with life imprisonment in Russia.