A Russian sabotage and reconnaissance group was preparing to shoot down a passenger plane over the territory of Russia or Belarus. Ukrainians should bear responsibility for the attack, the Security Service of Ukraine reported on Facebook. According to the representative of the SBU, thanks to a successful special operation, the enemy was neutralized.
– The SBU carried out a multi-stage special operation, during which it neutralized a deeply secretive and reconnaissance group of the enemy. Agents of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces were preparing a terrorist attack – they planned to shoot down a passenger plane over the territory of Russia or Belarus, – SBU spokesman Artem Dekhtyarenko said in a Facebook video.
– The invaders intended to baselessly accuse Ukraine and our partners of attacking the plane. As a provocation, the attackers wanted to shoot down a civilian aircraft from a portable (…) Stinger launcher. In order to kidnap him and secretly take him abroad, representatives of the special services of the aggressor country instructed their intelligence group to perform a specific task. Its activities were coordinated by Russian Alexander Tyutyerev, who is an employee of the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (Russian military intelligence, formerly the GRU), the SBU representative said.
Russian trick
Saboteurs posing as “patriotic volunteers” tried to establish contacts with representatives of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. To confirm their authenticity, they provided the Ukrainian army with reliable information about the location and movements of the occupying troops, consisting of mercenaries from Chechnya, the so-called. Kadyrovtsy. “In the future, Russian agents planned to use their connections to illegally acquire a foreign portable anti-aircraft missile system and smuggle it into the country of the aggressor,” the SBU said, adding that during the special operation, service officers detained all three participants in the sabotage. and reconnaissance group.