Russian General Lt. Gen. Fanil Sarvarov Killed in Moscow Car Bomb in Suspected Assassination

A Russian general has been killed in a car bombing attack in Moscow, officials confirmed.

Russia’s Investigative Committee stated that Lt. Gen. Fanil Sarvarov died on Monday morning after an explosive device planted in his vehicle detonated in what appears to be a suspected assassination.

Lt. Gen. Sarvarov, 56, was the head of the Department of Operational Training of the Russian armed forces.

Russian authorities initially reported that the general had been seriously wounded but later confirmed his death.

Svetlana Petrenko, official spokesperson for Russia’s Investigative Committee, said investigators are pursuing multiple lines of inquiry regarding the murder.

“One of these is that the crime was orchestrated by Ukrainian intelligence services,” Petrenko added. Ukraine has not commented on the allegation.

Russian media reported that the car exploded in a parking lot on Moscow’s Yaseneva Street around 7 a.m. while Sarvarov was inside. The top brass commander was en route to work at the Russian Defence Minister’s office when his Kia Sorento exploded.

Early reports indicated that the general suffered “multiple shrapnel injuries, closed fractures, leg injuries, and a fractured facial bone.”

This incident follows a pattern of targeted attacks on senior Russian military figures. Ukraine was previously believed to have been behind similar assassinations. In December 2024, Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, chief of the military’s nuclear, biological, and chemical protection forces, was killed by a bomb hidden on an electric scooter outside his apartment. His assistant, Ilya Polikarpov, was also killed in that attack.

The attack on Kirillov came just a day after Kyiv leveled criminal charges against him, highlighting an ongoing cycle of targeted strikes against high-ranking Russian military officials.