Lieutenant General Vladimir Alexeyev, first deputy head of Russia’s military intelligence agency GRU, was shot several times by an unidentified assailant who then fled, Russia’s Investigative Committee said. Alexeyev was hospitalized and reported to be in serious condition.
Investigators said the attack took place early Friday morning in a residential building on Volokolamskoye Highway in northwest Moscow. Russian media, citing witnesses, reported that Alexeyev was shot in the back around 7 a.m. as he left his apartment and walked toward an elevator.
“The attacker fired several shots and escaped the scene,” Investigative Committee spokeswoman Svetlana Petrenko said, according to Russian media.
Alexeyev, 64, has held the post of first deputy GRU chief since 2011 and was awarded the title Hero of Russia by President Vladimir Putin. He previously played a key role in negotiations with Wagner mercenary group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin during the failed mutiny in June 2023 and was responsible for relations between the Defense Ministry and Wagner.
Since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, several senior Russian military figures have been killed or wounded in assassination-style attacks. Reuters noted that Ukrainian intelligence has claimed responsibility for some of those killings.
The most recent fatal attack before Friday killed General Fanil Sarvarov in December 2025, when a bomb planted in his car exploded. In December 2024, General Igor Kirillov, commander of Russia’s radiological, chemical and biological defense forces, was also killed in an attack.
Alexeyev has been under Western sanctions. The European Union sanctioned him over the 2018 poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury, England, using the nerve agent Novichok. He was also sanctioned by the United States over alleged Russian cyber interference.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said President Putin had been briefed on the shooting. “It is clear that military commanders and high-level specialists are at risk during wartime,” Peskov said, adding that ensuring their safety was a matter for security services.
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Source: PAP, Reuters