Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office said Tuesday that the body of the female suspect involved in the June 29 bombing against a Ukrainian tycoon in Monaco has been found.
The agency said the woman was murdered, with a former law enforcement officer – of an unspecified agency – and a current employee of Ukraine’s Military Intelligence (HUR) suspected of her murder in Ukraine.
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In its press release, the office said the suspect, identified as a Ukrainian citizen named Anastasiia Berezovska, returned to the country on July 1, with pre-trial investigations beginning the same day.
The agency said authorities identified her contacts with her family and the two men upon her return, with the two men having “repeatedly made transfers to Berezovska A.’s crypto and bank accounts.”
During a search operation, the HUR employee reportedly acknowledged killing Berezovska but denied official HUR involvement.
“At the same time, the latter reported that he did not inform his superiors about his contacts with Berezovska A., the transfer of funds to her, and any other actions he took, and acted at his own discretion,” the press release says.
The office said authorities uncovered a “basement room resembling a torture chamber” at the home of the former law enforcement officer and later recovered Berezovska’s body, with “gunshot wounds to the head, and pistol cartridges.”
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Berezovska’s body was recovered at 11 p.m. on Monday, according to law enforcement sources cited by local outlet Ukrainska Pravda. It is unclear when the murder took place.
The office said the investigation is aided by the National Police and the counterintelligence unit of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), with HUR chief Oleh Ivashchenko providing “personal assistance” to the investigation.
HUR has not commented publicly on the incident.
The office added that it has provided all available evidence to European authorities.
Monaco bombing – the timeline
On June 29, an individual left a package in the entrance hall of an apartment building in Monaco, near the French border.
Shortly afterward, the package exploded in the hall just as Ukrainian businessman Vadym Iermolaiev and his family were entering. The explosion tore through the residential building and injured seven people.
Iermolaiev and his wife were hospitalized in serious condition, while Monaco prosecutors said their 13-year-old son’s life was not in danger.
The suspect, who was captured on CCTV wearing a black fisherman’s hat, was initially believed to be a man.
On Friday, July 3, European authorities identified the suspect as 39-year-old Berezovska, who had been living in Frankfurt, Germany, with Monaco confirming that it had issued an Interpol Red Notice a day prior, on July 2.
After the explosion, Berezovska is believed to have walked to the nearby French town of Beausoleil, where she retrieved her rental car and drove through Italy to Germany, her last known country of residence, according to Morgan Raymond, Monaco’s deputy public prosecutor.
However, the latest updates from Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office suggest that Berezovska had returned to the country a day before the Interpol Red Notice was issued, where she was subsequently murdered.
Who is Vadym Iermolaiev?
Iermolaiev is the founder of the Dnipro-based industrial and trading group Alef and a long-time figure on Forbes’ list of Ukraine’s wealthiest individuals. His fortune was estimated at $220 million in 2021.
He renounced his Ukrainian citizenship in 2019 and later obtained Cypriot nationality.
In 2023, President Volodymyr Zelensky imposed a 10-year sanctions package against Iermolaiev over allegations tied to his alcohol business operations in Russian-occupied Crimea, where his companies reportedly paid taxes to Moscow.
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