A Russian couple just returning from vacation to their quiet neighborhood in St. Petersburg was running errands Thursday morning when an improvised explosive device tore through their vehicle.
The driver, a middle-aged man, was killed instantly, while witnesses said his wife had apparently survived but was seriously injured.
The couple’s daughter, according to local reports, just happened to be away at summer camp.
While Russian investigators identified the victim only as a member of the military, they left out that he was accused of war crimes in Ukraine. The independent news outlet Agentstvo identified the man as Sergei Sechkov, a 43-year-old lieutenant colonel of the 332nd Independent Guards Red Banner Helicopter Regiment, which Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence (HUR) accuses of deliberate missile and bombing strikes on civilians.
Sechkov’s father is said to have confirmed his son’s death to Agentstvo by bluntly saying he was “blown up.” The lieutenant colonel apparently knew he was a marked man, as he had told his superiors previously that he was on a “list for liquidation” and thus had gotten into the habit of regularly checking his vehicle for explosive devices.
His fiery death came just a few weeks after another bombing in central Moscow—one that failed to wipe out its primary target, the commander-in-chief of Russian Aerospace Forces, but reportedly took out his son-in-law and another top military general. Days later, in Russian-occupied Crimea, a bomb planted in a trash bin killed a high-ranking Russian naval officer who had defected from Ukraine years earlier.
Russia’s Investigative Committee has blamed Ukraine for the attacks but stopped short of saying the quiet part out loud: that this wave of bombings is part of a bigger campaign.
“Ukraine’s targeted killing program has been working against Russian officers who Kyiv accuses of war crimes, the lists of names are public – Ukraine is targeting not only generals and colonels, the network built by the Ukrainian special services is much broader,” Vladimir Putin’s former speech writer, Abbas Gallyamov, told the Daily Beast.
Russia’s security services have trumpeted their efforts to prevent what they describe as “terrorist attacks” by Ukraine, informing the public in early July of “an attempt by Ukrainian special services, with the direct participation of Western curators, to carry out sabotage and terrorist acts of unprecedented scale and threat” against Russian military personnel.
But on August 2, Russia’s National Anti-Terrorism Committee admitted that a female bomber killed and injured dozens of people. The young woman reportedly brought a bomb to commander-in-chief of Russian Aerospace Forces Alexander Chaiko’s birthday party; among those killed was reportedly the former commander of Russia’s 49th Combined Arms Army, Major General Valery Plohotnyuk.
The wave of deadly attacks that Moscow blames on Ukraine’s intelligence services has not been deterred by Vladimir Putin’s order to increase protection for his top officers.
And Ukraine has made no secret of its plans to target Russian military officers accused of war crimes, even compiling and releasing a list of “executioners” against whom Kyiv is seeking “payback.”
The suspect in the latest bombing, a 24-year-old woman, had reportedly been recruited on social media. She planted “powerful” explosives under Sechkov’s vehicle, went to the airport, and flew first to Turkey and then to Moldova.
The Kremlin has not acknowledged the spate of apparent revenge killings, which are largely swept under the rug in state-controlled media.
“Putin doesn’t like failures of the security services or generals; that’s why he didn’t fire army general Sergey Shoigu from the post of Russia’s defense minister for so long – he treats failures as an insult,” Gallyamov told the Daily Beast.
Almost five years after unleashing his war against Ukraine, Putin’s domestic problems have been piling up more and more each day, with the country’s air defenses failing to stop attacks, one-third of Russian oil refineries no longer working as a result of Ukrainian drone attacks, and a staggering death toll on the battlefield.
More than 220,000 Russian soldiers have been killed, according to the BBC. But the State Duma’s Defense Committee has suggested the war can drag on for years, saying Russia should complete the war in Ukraine by 2030 to prepare for a possible conflict with NATO.
“Russians don’t like the FSB and Putin’s failures, they didn’t support such a long and bloody war against a strong enemy,” Gallyamov told the Daily Beast. “Trump cannot help Putin stop the assassinations inside Russia, though I am sure that request was on the list for discussion during the CIA boss’ visit this week.”
