MOSCOW, February 28. /TASS/. Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has prevented an attack on Metropolitan Tikhon (Shevkunov) of Simferopol and Crimea, orchestrated by Ukraine’s military intelligence in Moscow.
A Russian citizen and a Ukrainian citizen have been detained and charged, the FSB told TASS.
TASS has compiled key details on what we know so far.
Attack disrupted
- Russia’s FSB has foiled an attack on Metropolitan Tikhon of Crimea, orchestrated by the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s Main Directorate of Intelligence.
- Cleric Nikita Ivankovich and Denis Popovich, an aide to the metropolitan, a Russian citizen and a Ukrainian citizen, respectively, have been arrested for planning the attack.
- An improvised explosive device and two fake Ukrainian passports have been seized from the two suspects, the FSB said.
- They have already confessed.
- More than 70 Ukrainian telephone numbers, including that of Margarita Revchachenko, the spokeswoman for the Ukrainian armed forces, have been found on their phones.
- The detainees were recruited via Telegram in mid-2024.
- In December 2024, an improvised explosive device was passed to them via a hidden location.
- A criminal investigation has been launched.
Confessions
- Popovich, who comes from the Ukrainian city of Chernovtsy, said that he had been recruited by the Ukrainian special services under the threat that his family would be killed.
- According to the detainees, they were supposed to plant an explosive device in Metropolitan Tikhon’s apartment at Sretensky Monastery in Moscow. Under the plot, the metropolitan’s aide, Popovich, was to smuggle the bomb into the church.