A senior Russian military intelligence officer, Lieutenant General Vladimir Alexeyev, has been shot in an assassination attempt outside his Moscow apartment. The 64-year-old deputy head of the GRU was attacked by an unidentified gunman who fired several shots before fleeing, according to investigators.
Alexeyev has been linked to the 2018 Salisbury poisonings, in which former Russian agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were poisoned with the novichok nerve agent. The attack also led to the death of British woman Dawn Sturgess. The EU imposed sanctions on Alexeyev over the incident, and a UK public inquiry concluded that President Vladimir Putin must have authorised the attack.
Russia has blamed Ukraine for the assassination attempt, with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov claiming it was designed to sabotage peace talks. Ukrainian military intelligence has previously claimed responsibility for killing several senior Russian officers since the start of the war in 2022.
Alexeyev sustained gunshot wounds to an arm, leg and chest during a struggle with the attacker, according to Russian daily Kommersant. The Kremlin said Putin has been briefed and that intelligence services are investigating. Some pro-Kremlin figures have questioned why such a high-ranking official was not better protected.
Alexeyev was also responsible for liaison between the Defence Ministry and the Wagner mercenary group, whose leader Yevgeny Prigozhin staged a mutiny in 2023 before dying in a plane crash. The attack comes amid a series of assassinations of Russian officials since December 2024.
