The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said that the killing of the Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko must have been ordered by Russian security agencies.
“According to data obtained by the SBU, the murder of the Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko was ordered by Russian security services,” SBU chief Vasyl Hrytsak said at a briefing in Kyiv on May 30.
To carry out the plan, they recruited a Ukrainian citizen, “G.,” who in turn hired, for money, former Donbas combatants to carry out the murder.
“Citizen G. offered his acquaintance, a former ATO (Anti-Terrorist Operation) soldier, to kill the Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko for $30,000,” Hrytsak said.
As a down payment, he left a deposit of $15,000,” he said, showing a video of the money being paid.
Following a security operation, SBU officers arrested the organizer of the murder, Hrytsak said.
“It is known that once the killing was done, G. was planning to leave Ukraine. […] He was planning to travel to Russia via a third country,” Hrytsak said.
It transpired on May 30 that Babchenko’s “murder” was part of a special operation of the Ukrainian security services. The journalist turned out to be alive and well.
Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko said that investigators will “work to identify the person who ordered this crime which was planned but not carried out, thanks to the SBU.”
“Yesterday, today, and even as we speak, inquiries are underway to obtain more information about who ordered this murder. According to preliminary data available to investigators, we have enough facts pointing towards Russia as the party that ordered [of the murder],” Lutsenko said at a briefing on May 30.
At the same time, he said he was disappointed by the reaction from the Ukrainian body politic to the reports of Babchenko’s murder.
Lutsenko urged politicians and public figures to retract the statements they had made in the preceding 24 hours, “pouring dirt and lies” on Ukrainian law enforcement.
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