Ukrainian court detains suspects in Monaco bombing suspect’s killing

A Ukrainian intelligence officer accused of killing the woman wanted over a bomb attack in Monaco has withdrawn his confession, telling a Kyiv court he did not pull the trigger and blaming his co-defendant instead.

Vladyslav Reut, 34, a serving and decorated officer in Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, the GUR, and Vitalii Zhykovych, 50, a former law enforcement officer who until recently worked for Ukraine’s SBU security service, were ordered held without bail Thursday as investigators examine the killing of Anastasiia Berezovska.

Berezovska, a 39-year-old Ukrainian, had been named by Interpol as a key suspect in a June 29 bomb attack in Monaco that seriously wounded Ukrainian-born businessman Vadym Yermolaiev, his son and his partner. Monaco authorities had charged her with attempted murder, placing an explosive device in public with criminal intent, and criminal conspiracy.

The blast, described by Al Jazeera as a powerful explosion, rocked a residential building in Monaco near the French border. The motive for that attack remains unclear. Yermolaiev, a multimillionaire who made his money in cognac and real estate, renounced Ukrainian citizenship for Cypriot nationality and has been sanctioned by Kyiv since 2023 for continuing to do business in Russian-occupied Crimea.

Ukrainian authorities said Berezovska’s body was found Tuesday with gunshot wounds to the head. Cartridges were found nearby. Prosecutors said in court that she had arrived in Ukraine by bus from Poland two days after the Monaco blast, before she had been identified as the prime suspect.

Investigators appear to have focused on Reut and Zhykovych after examining Berezovska’s phone records and identifying cash and cryptocurrency transfers the two men had made to her accounts. Earlier this week, Reut confessed to shooting Berezovska and led investigators to a grave in woods west of Kyiv, where her body had been covered with branches.

But at Thursday’s custody hearing, Reut said he wanted to “tell the truth” and “categorically denied” murdering her.

“I fought enemy combatants while defending my country,” he told the court. “I would never intentionally murder an innocent civilian woman.”

Reut said he and Zhykovych drove in his BMW to pick up Berezovska on the highway to Kyiv because she “needed to be hidden” in connection with “a criminal matter,” without clarifying what that matter was. He said Zhykovych took a modified Makarov pistol from a rucksack and loaded it, saying it was a precaution “in case she panics.”

After the three went to a forest path near the village of Yuriv, Reut said Zhykovych ordered him to shoot Berezovska, telling him: “It’s either her or us.” Reut said Zhykovych then killed her with four shots, after which the two men dug a grave and hid the body. He said Zhykovych threw the gun and Berezovska’s belongings into a nearby lake.

Reut said he confessed because Zhykovych threatened his relatives. “He said, ‘If anything happens to me, your relatives are in danger,’” Reut told the court.

Zhykovych’s lawyer, Anatoliy Ivanov, rejected Reut’s new account. He described his client as a low-level former SBU officer and questioned the idea that a civilian could order a serving GUR member to carry out a killing. He called Zhykovych a “patriot” who fought in eastern Ukraine in 2014 and helped defend the Kyiv region after Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.

“He does not want to be imprisoned. I understand,” Ivanov said of Reut’s statement. But he insisted his client “did not kill.”

Prosecutors said the two men acted “jointly and in a coordinated fashion” and both have been charged with premeditated murder. Prosecutor Dmytro Tkachuk told the BBC that “all versions are being considered” and said one suspect had “revealed” information about a possible motive, but that disclosing it now would hinder the investigation.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Thursday night he would have “additional relevant reports” to share in the coming days.