Russia knew about terrorist attack plot since Feb 15 - Ukraine’s defense intel chief
This was stated by the head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of Ukraine’s Defense Ministry, Kyrylo Budanov, who spoke at the Third International Strategic Communications Forum, reports the press service of the Ministry of Defense, according to Ukrinform.
"At least, since February 15, 2024, the Russian Federation had been aware about the plot. I will tell you more, this information passed through their intelligence station in Syria. From there it was forwarded to Moscow. So they shouldn’t be telling tales that this all materialized in a strange way out of nowhere," Budanov emphasized.
According to Budanov, Russia knew where the combat groups would come from and via which two countries they would move to the territory of Russia.
"Why did they allow this to happen? There are several options. The first is, as is customary among them, a infighting between ‘Kremlin towers’ to remove several high-ranking officials now. Another option is that they actually underestimated the scale of what would happen. They thought that the incident would be more local, and wanted to blame Ukraine for everything," said the top intelligence official.
He noted that the Kremlin had already changed three versions of what happened at Crocus City Hall near Moscow, trying to at least somehow create the so-called "Ukrainian trace" in the terrorist attack.
"Patrushev and Bortnikov's explanations emerged as both accused me personally, and Ukraine in general, of doing this all. This is nonsense. By the way, if we touched on this painful issue, even though it is an enemy, I do not approve of terrorist attacks against civilians in principle," Budanov said.
The head of Ukrainian intelligence added that Russia itself sowed chaos and self-confidently believed that it could control it.
"There is such a stable expression, I’d say, truth. It always circulates in intelligence circles: everyone tries to create controlled chaos. Absolutely all more or less serious organizations have tried to do this at different times. And the axiom is that none of them could make it controlled. The same thing happened here," concluded the head of the intelligence agency.
As reported, on the evening of March 22, terrorists staged a mass shooting at the Crocus City Hall concert venue in the suburbs of Moscow. The perpetrators left 143 people dead and over 180 wounded and burned down the venue.
Four male suspects of Tajik origin were detained on. Three more natives of Tajikistan were remanded in custody on conspiracy charges.
