Russian authorities say they have detained a man described as a \u201cUkrainian special services agent\u201d in connection with a car explosion that killed Russian General Yaroslav Moskalik on Friday. <\/p>\n
The suspect allegedly purchased the car that exploded in Balashikha, less than 20 miles east of Moscow, according to TASS citing Russia\u2019s Federal Security Service. The suspect\u2019s nationality is unclear; according to the FSB, he has a residence permit in Ukraine. <\/p>\n
The FSB also accused him of planting an explosive device in the car, but said that it was detonated from Ukraine. Video published by TASS on Saturday appeared to show charred electronics and parts of the car. Russia\u2019s Investigative Committee had previously said the blast was caused by an improvised explosive device packed with shrapnel. <\/p>\n
Photos released by Russian authorities appear to show the suspect driving a dark green Volkswagen with license plates that match those purportedly found at the site of the blast. <\/p>\n
TASS video also showed the man being put into a van, and included footage of him apparently in custody describing his alleged recruitment by Ukraine\u2019s special services. It\u2019s unclear if he was under duress during the confession. <\/p>\n
Moskalik was killed on the same day US special envoy Steve Witkoff met with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin to discuss efforts to end Russia\u2019s war on Ukraine. <\/p>\n
After the three-hour meeting, US President Donald Trump initially voiced optimism that both sides were \u201cvery close to a deal.\u201d <\/p>\n
But the next day, Trump questioned whether Putin wants a peace deal shortly after meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the Vatican for Pope Francis\u2019 funeral. <\/p>\n
In a Truth Social post sent as he returned from Rome after the meeting, Trump raised the prospect of apply\ufeffing new sanctions on Russia after its assault on Kyiv last week. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere was no reason for Putin to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, cities and towns, over the last few days,\u201d Trump wrote. \u201cIt makes me think that maybe he doesn\u2019t want to stop the war, he\u2019s just tapping me along, and has to be dealt with differently, through \u2018Banking\u2019 or \u2018Secondary Sanctions?\u2019 Too many people are dying!!!\u201d <\/p>\n
This is a developing story and will be updated.<\/i> <\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Russian authorities say they have detained a man described as a \u201cUkrainian special services agent\u201d…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16157,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16156\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}