On 13 February, Maksim Kuźminov was strolling in front of his home in the town of Villajoyosa, where he had late moved. According to witness reports, the sound of shots abruptly spread, and then – a fast-moving car. The victim was to be hit with 5 or six bullets and then run over. Initially, Spanish police reported that he was killed as a 33-year-old Ukrainian citizen, resulting from his own documents. However, citing sources approximated to the investigation, the EFE news agency reported that it was actually a 28-year-old Russian pilot who was most likely hiding under a false identity.
These reports the local police did not want to comment any more: it was announced to the Russian journalists that further investigation had been classified, and "additional information will be provided by the authorities of another state". These spoke almost after a week – confirming only that Kuźminow was killed. "He decided to decision to Spain alternatively of staying here," quoted his origin in the military intelligence portal Ukrainian Truth.
“For all we know, he invited his ex-girlfriend to his home and found him shot....’. The reaction of Russian authorities to reports of the destiny of a hero of 1 of the loudest actions of Ukrainian peculiar services in this war was rather symptomatic. The Head of abroad Intelligence Service (SWR) Sergei Naryszkin described the individual killed as “a traitor and a criminal” and stated that Kuźminov had become “a moral corpse as shortly as he planned his dirty and terrible crime.” That is, what the Ukrainian services call "the consequence of a long-term peculiar operation", which is to get the Russian pilot to control to the another side. And even the Mi-8 chopper he hijacked.
This operation was successfully carried out last August. It was besides announced at the time that the prize for this feat was $500,000, and it was betrayed that even before the pilot's escape from Russia, safety guarantees were promised not only to him but besides to his closest. To this end (under cover of a journey to Turkey) his parent had already been evacuated from Russia in advance. No another relatives Kuźminov had, in the country he left only a girl... Is she the 1 who tracked the assassins by visiting him now in Spain?
Sentence to a fugitive whose escape paid for the lives of 2 another chopper crew members who were shot during the flight. Last October, a study about Kuźminów's escape was released on Rossia-1 television. It featured masked GRU officers who assured that the traitor would “not live to see the court”. – We have long hands – provided 1 of them.
