Russian General Is Killed in Car Bombing in Moscow

The attack appeared to be the latest targeted assassination of a senior military official inside Russia’s borders.

A senior Russian general was killed on Monday in Moscow after a bomb placed under his car exploded, the country’s investigative committee said in a statement, in what appeared to be the latest high-profile assassination of Ukraine’s opponents inside Russia.

The statement identified the officer as Lt. Gen. Fanil Sarvarov, who served as the head of the Russian General Staff’s army operational training directorate. Investigators said that they were looking into whether the bombing had been orchestrated by the Ukrainian intelligence services and that they had opened a criminal investigation.

The Security Service of Ukraine, known as the S.B.U., had no immediate comment on the bombing.

Images from the scene showed several damaged cars cordoned off by police officers and investigators. The explosion occurred early in the morning in a middle-class residential district in the south of Moscow.

Since the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, several senior Russian army commanders have been killed in targeted assassinations claimed by the Ukrainian special services. While many top Russian officers were killed on the battlefield early in the war during a failed attempt at a quick victory, the past two years have seen a shift toward targeted assassinations inside Russia.

In April, Lt. Gen. Yaroslav Moskalik, the deputy head of the main operational department of the General Staff, was killed after a car bomb went off. In December 2024, Igor Kirillov, a general in charge of the Russian military’s nuclear and chemical weapons protection forces, died after an explosive device planted in a scooter detonated near the entrance to a residential building.

President Vladimir V. Putin described Mr. Kirillov’s killing as a “severe blunder” and said that Russian special services must prevent such cases from happening in the future. On Monday, Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesman, said Mr. Putin had been briefed immediately about the latest killing, of Mr. Sarvarov.

On its website, the Russian defense ministry said that Mr. Sarvarov, 56, had served in Chechnya and had taken part in Russia’s military operation in Syria.

His killing occurred during a period of renewed diplomatic efforts to end the war. Ukrainian and Russian officials have been traveling to the United States to meet with President Trump’s envoys to discuss the details of a potential agreement.

Major stumbling blocks remain, chief among them the question of Russian territorial demands and Ukraine’s insistence on securing solid security guarantees from its Western allies.

Over the weekend, Mr. Putin’s special envoy, Kirill Dmitriev, was in Florida to discuss a potential deal with Steve Witkoff, a Trump administration envoy; Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law; and Josh Gruenbaum, a White House adviser. Mr. Witkoff described the meetings as “productive and constructive,” and said that Russia remained “fully committed to achieving peace in Ukraine.”

Yuri Ushakov, the Kremlin’s top foreign policy aide, sounded a less positive note in remarks made in Moscow, saying that most of the proposals discussed had been put forth by Ukrainian and European representatives and were “rather unconstructive.” Mr. Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, said that Mr. Dmitriev would brief Mr. Putin on the talks upon his return to Moscow.

Also on Monday, Ukraine’s defense intelligence agency said it had attacked an airfield over the weekend in the Lipetsk region of Russia, near the Ukrainian border, and destroyed two fighter jets.

The local Russian authorities in Lipetsk have not commented about the reported attack, and the Ukrainian agency’s claim could not immediately be independently verified.

Kyiv has repeatedly targeted Russian airfields, including the one in Lipetsk, which is near Kursk. The Ukrainian campaign, often using attack drones, is aimed at blunting Moscow’s ability to keep bombing cities and towns in Ukraine.

Cassandra Vinograd contributed reporting from Kyiv, Ukraine.

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