A top Russian military general allegedly involved in the 2018 Salisbury poisonings has been shot outside his Moscow apartment in an apparent assassination attempt. Lieutenant General Vladimir Alexeyev, 64, deputy head of the GRU military intelligence agency, was attacked by an unidentified gunman who fired several shots before fleeing, according to investigators.
Alexeyev is believed to have been behind the novichok nerve agent attack on former Russian agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury, which also led to the death of Dawn Sturgess, a 44-year-old mother of three. The European Union imposed sanctions on Alexeyev over the poisoning, and a UK public inquiry concluded in December that President Vladimir Putin must have ordered the attack.
Russia's foreign minister Sergei Lavrov blamed Ukraine for the assassination attempt, accusing Kyiv of trying to sabotage peace talks without providing evidence. Since the start of the war in 2022, Ukrainian military intelligence has claimed responsibility for killing several senior Russian officers.
The Kommersant daily reported that the attacker was waiting when Alexeyev left for work, and that he sustained gunshot wounds to an arm, leg and chest during a struggle. The Kremlin said it hoped Alexeyev would survive, and that Putin had been briefed. Three other officials of the same rank have been killed in or near Moscow since December 2024.
Alexeyev, born in Ukraine when it was part of the Soviet Union, was also placed under US sanctions over Russian cyber interference in the 2016 US presidential election. He was responsible for relations between the Defence Ministry and the Wagner mercenary group, and was sent to negotiate with its leader Yevgeny Prigozhin during his mutiny in June 2023.
