A Ukrainian female powerlifting champion has been captured by Russia and accused of plotting to assassinate one of Putin’s top military officials.
Yulia Lemeshchenko, 41, was one of four women agents detained by the FSB security service, Russian media claims.
She had a Russian passport and Kyiv used this to deploy her to get behind enemy lines and take out a leading military target, the FSB alleges.
Lemeshchenko is seen testifying in an FSB video, but it is not known if she was put under pressure to confess to recruitment during the war.
She was detained at her flat in Voronezh city in mid-January and it is unclear why the Russians have only now revealed her to be in custody.
The athlete was a 2021 Ukrainian winner in the Classic Powerlifting Championship, securing three gold medals.
‘In 2023, I was recruited by the Ukrainian security services,’ she said in a video shared online.
‘I was trained in Kyiv and acquired skills in handling small arms, operating drones, evading surveillance, and making explosive devices,’ she said, adding that her handler gave her the alias ‘Luffy’.
‘In 2024, I arrived in Russia and, on the instructions of Ukrainian special services, was [ordered] to commit a terrorist act against a high-ranking serviceman from the Russian Defence Ministry.’
Lemeshchenko is understood to have been born in the Russian city of Stary Oskol before moving to Ukraine in 2014 and settling in Kharkiv.
The Russian citizen allegedly set out to carry the attack for Kyiv in order to obtain Ukrainian citizenship, reports suggest.
All four women detained by the FSB had been trained ‘in handling firearms and bombs, drone control and outdoor surveillance’, the security agency said.
Another female agent was recruited two years ago and deployed to Rostov-on-Don on a ‘mission to kill’.
One more was assigned to snoop on top officials and sent to Sevastopol in Russian-occupied Crimea. First, she had to pass a polygraph test in Kyiv.
‘I had to plant an explosive device in his office,’ she said, referring to her target.
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