‘A war criminal and a legitimate target’. Russian general assassinated in Moscow accused Kyiv and the West of secret biolabs, drone-delivered mosquitoes, and engineered pandemics

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Igor Kirillov

In the hours before dawn on December 17, a bomb detonated on a Moscow street, killing the head of Russia’s radioactive, chemical, and biological defense forces. Ukrainian intelligence quickly claimed responsibility through the media, calling General Igor Kirillov a “war criminal,” while former president and current deputy chairman of the Security Council Dmitry Medvedev wasted no time in calling for the “elimination” of Ukraine’s military and political leadership in response. But Kirillov was known for more than just his title — since Russia’s February 2022 invasion, he’d accused Kyiv and its allies of everything from running secret biolabs and developing drone-delivered mosquitoes to planning dirty bombs and designing weaponized pandemics. Meduza looks back at some of Kirillov’s more controversial claims.

Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, head of Russia’s radioactive, chemical, and biological defense forces, was killed early Tuesday morning in Moscow when a bomb exploded outside a residential building. The explosive device, attached to a scooter, detonated as Kirillov and an aide exited the building.

Hours later, Ukrainian intelligence effectively claimed responsibility. Citing “sources in the intelligence services,” multiple media outlets simultaneously reported that Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) was behind the assassination. The sources described Kirillov as a “war criminal and legitimate target” who had ordered the use of “prohibited chemical weapons against Ukrainian forces.”

Igor Kirillov had led Russia’s radioactive, chemical, and biological defense forces since May, 2017. After the start of the full-scale war in February 2022, he began regularly holding briefings accusing the U.S. and Ukraine of using biological weapons allegedly developed in “biolabs” in Kyiv.

At his first such briefing in June 2022, Kirillov claimed that U.S.-supervised biolabs in Ukraine were researching viruses capable of spreading through mosquitoes. He alleged that the U.S. planned to use drones to deliver infected mosquitoes to targeted areas, where they would then be released to infect Russian troops.

Kirillov also accused Ukrainian scientists, allegedly working under Pentagon orders, of collecting highly pathogenic strains of bird flu in 2021 that could cross the species barrier.

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In August 2023, Kirillov alleged that the United States had created a “pandemic preparation department” tasked with “mutating viruses” to create a new pandemic. In December of the same year, he asserted that documents discovered in Ukrainian “laboratories” in Rubizhne, Sievierodonetsk, and Kherson “revealed the dangerous nature of the Pentagon’s biological activities.” According to Kirillov, the documents also showed that staff at a Ukrainian biosphere reserve were studying bird flu strains.

Kirillov further accused Ukraine of planning to create a “dirty bomb,” claiming that spent nuclear fuel, supposedly imported into Ukraine from Europe for disposal, could be used for this purpose. According to a source cited by RBC, Kirillov had been scheduled to hold another briefing on the day of his assassination, though the topic was not disclosed.

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The attack came just one day after Ukraine’s SBU named Kirillov as a suspect in a war crimes case, accusing him of overseeing the “mass use of chemical weapons against the Ukrainian Armed Forces.” Despite mutual accusations from Russia and Ukraine about chemical weapons use during the war, independent international organizations, including the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), have yet to confirm any of these claims.

Kirillov’s assassination provoked strong reactions from Russia’s pro-war commentators, Novaya Gazeta Europe reported. The Rybar Telegram channel, which has ties to Russia’s Defense Ministry, remarked that despite Russia’s “successes” on the battlefield, “the other side always retains the ability to deliver a painful blow.” War blogger Yury Kotenok called for stronger counterintelligence measures, including the introduction of martial law “beyond the border regions,” while the Revenge of Goodwill channel vowed that Kirillov’s killing “will not go unanswered” and urged Russian authorities to take “preemptive action.”

Kirillov’s death marks the third known assassination of a prominent supporter of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on internationally recognized Russian territory since the full-scale war began. In August 2022, Darya Dugina, the daughter of far-right ideologue Alexander Dugin, was killed in a car bombing near Moscow. In April 2023, Vladlen Tatarsky, a self-described “war correspondent,” died in a bombing at a St. Petersburg café.

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