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According to Ukrainian government officials and news sources, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy has survived a number of assassination and kidnapping attempts by Russian or pro-Russian agents during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. [1] [2]
In order to achieve a quick victory during the invasion of Ukraine, Russia planned to have groups enter the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv and destroy Ukraine's leadership. [3] Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak stated that "Russia's key intention [was] to remove the country's top leadership, create maximum panic, and try to establish its own puppet government". [4]
According to the Ukrainian government, in early February 2022, Russian president Vladimir Putin instructed Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov to eliminate Ukrainian leaders. [5] In early March, Ukraine intelligence said that Chechen commandos sent to assassinate Zelenskyy had been "eliminated", with help from FSB agents sympathetic to Ukraine. [6]
In February 2022, Redut PMC was ordered on a covert mission in the Kyiv region to infiltrate and eliminate the political leadership and the Ukrainian Secret Service, by storming those institutions. [7] More than one thousand fighters entered the Kyiv region for this purpose, [8] yet the mission failed due to Ukraine and the West knowing of much of these plans, resulting in Redut losing up to 90% of their fighting force. [9]
More than 400 Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group were reported to have been in Kyiv by late February 2022, with orders to assassinate Zelenskyy and destabilise the government enough for Russia to take control. [10]
In August 2023, it was reported that another alleged assassination attempt had been stopped after Ukraine's security service arrested a woman who was suspected of gathering information on Zelenskyy's trip to the Mykolaiv region. [11]
During the conflict there were conflicting accounts of the number of assassination attempts made against Zelenskyy. Presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak referenced the issue while speaking to the Ukrainian Pravda news outlet, saying, "Our foreign partners are talking about two or three attempts. I believe that there were more than a dozen attempts". [12]
In addition, on Saturday, 26 February 2022, an assassination attempt by a group of Chechen mercenaries was prevented on the outskirts of Kyiv with the would be assassins killed. [5]
In early March 2022, the head of Ukraine's National Security Council, Oleksiy Danilov, said that Zelenskyy had survived three assassination attempts in one week. Danilov credited the aid of anti-war intelligence officers within Russia's FSB who shared information with Ukrainian forces about the planned attacks by two groups of assassins from Chechnya. [13]
During an interview with CBS News on 6 March 2022, U.S. secretary of state Antony Blinken said that the Ukrainian government had prepared for the potential death of Zelenskyy in the invasion, but would not disclose additional details. [14]
The Security Service of Ukraine or SBU is the law enforcement authority and main intelligence and security agency of the Ukrainian government, in the areas of counter-intelligence activity and combating organized crime and terrorism. The Constitution of Ukraine defines the SBU as a military formation, and its staff are considered military personnel with ranks. It is subordinated directly under the authority of the president of Ukraine. The SBU also operates its own special forces unit, the Alpha Group.
Servant of the People, sometimes also known as Servant of the Nation, is a Ukrainian political satire comedy television series created and produced by Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who stars as Vasily Petrovych Goloborodko, a high-school history teacher in his thirties who is unexpectedly elected President of Ukraine after a viral video filmed by one of his students shows him making a profane rant against government corruption in his country. The series ran for three seasons from 2015 to 2019, and a film adaptation was released in 2016.
Volodymyr Oleksandrovych Zelenskyy is a Ukrainian politician who has been serving as the sixth president of Ukraine since 2019. He was formerly a comedian and actor.
Andriy Borysovych Yermak is a Ukrainian film producer, lawyer and the Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appointed him on 11 February 2020. Yermak is also a member of the Headquarters of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, the highest command and control body for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. He was described as Zelensky’s right-hand man, and a "real power broker" of Ukraine.
The Crimea Platform is a diplomatic summit initiated by Ukrainian Volodymyr Zelenskyy in August 2021 and attended by delegations from 46 countries. It is designed to be an international coordination mechanism to restore Russia–Ukraine relations by means of reversing the 2014 annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation. The protection of the human rights of Crimean Tatars, environmental degradation and the stifling of trade in the Black and Azov Sea region are also matters discussed at the summit.
Mykhailo Mykhailovych Podolyak is a Ukrainian politician, journalist and negotiator, serving as the advisor to the head of the Office of the President of Ukraine. In 2022, he became one of the representatives of Ukraine at Russian-Ukrainian peace negotiations during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The Chechen Republic, commonly known as Chechnya, is a federal republic of Russia that has been noted in several roles during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Kadyrovite forces have fought alongside the Russian forces, while several Chechen armed volunteer formations are fighting on the Ukrainian side. International observers have noted a number of comparisons between the invasion and the First and Second Chechen Wars.
There have been several rounds of peace talks to halt Russia's 2022 invasion in Ukraine and end the Russo-Ukrainian War in an armistice. The first meeting was held four days after the start of the invasion, on 28 February 2022, in Belarus. It concluded without result, with delegations from both sides returning to their capitals for consultations. A second and third round of talks took place on 3 and 7 March 2022, on the Belarus–Ukraine border, in an undisclosed location in the Gomel region of Belarus. A fourth and fifth round of talks were respectively held on 10 and 14 March in Antalya, Turkey.
Serhiy Nakhmanovych Shefir is a Ukrainian politician and film director. He is the founder of Quarter-95 Studio. Since 25 May 2019 he is the First Assistant to the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. In September 2021 he survived an assassination attempt.
During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, which began on 24 February 2022, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has made a number of speeches in multiple formats, including on social media and to foreign legislatures. The speeches have received significant attention, with a number of commentators citing a positive effect on Ukrainian morale and on international support for Ukrainian resistance to the invasion.
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russia occupied vast portions of the territory of Ukraine, having already occupied parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts as well as the entire Autonomous Republic of Crimea since the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2014. Partisan groups began to be organized in mid-2022. These groups have been involved in intelligence-gathering, sabotage, and assassinations. Much of their activity has taken place in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions.
The resolution on recognition of the state sovereignty of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria was a bill proposed by Oleksiy Honcharenko and Musa Mahomedov in which the Verkhovna Rada, the Ukrainian parliament, would have voted on the recognition of Chechnya's independence, in response to Russia's recognition of the Luhansk People's Republic and the Donetsk People's Republic.
Volodymyr Lyubomyrovych Trush, is a Ukrainian public and civil official and entrepreneur who has served as the governor of Ternopil Oblast from 19 March 2020 to 29 December 2023.
In November 2021, top Ukrainian government officials outlined allegations of a plot to overthrow the democratically elected government of Ukraine which was to take place in early December of that year. The coup plot was allegedly orchestrated by Russia. The Russian government denied any involvement. Some months later, Russia launched an invasion of Ukraine, with the toppling of the Ukrainian government being one of its objectives.
Events in the year 2023 in Ukraine.
The Walk of the Brave was laid in Kyiv on the initiative of President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy for the 31st anniversary of Ukraine's independence. The place was not chosen by chance, because it was on the Constitution Square opposite the Verkhovna Rada.
On 3 May 2023, amidst the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, two explosive drones allegedly targeted the Kremlin in Moscow and were shot down. President Vladimir Putin was not present in the building at the time and no one was injured in the incident.
Estonia and Ukraine established diplomatic relations on 4 January 1992. Relations between the two countries have remained consistently close, largely in part due to shared concerns of any aspirations of the Russian Federation. Estonia is a member of the European Union, which Ukraine applied for in 2022. Both countries are full members of the Council of Europe.
Chechen fighters loyal to the Kremlin are being betrayed by Russian spies who are leaking their whereabouts to Ukrainian forces, an aide to President Zelensky has claimed. Aleksei Arestovich said that the FSB was 'quietly passing on' information about the movements of Chechen units.
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