Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (HUR) helped Denis Kapustin, the founder of the Russian Volunteer Corps (RVC) who was announced dead last week, to fake his death before claiming the bounty placed on his head by Russian security services, it said on Thursday.
Kapustin, 41, was previously reported killed by a Russian drone whilst carrying out a combat mission in the southeastern Zaporizhzhia region overnight on Saturday, Dec. 27.
On Jan. 1, HUR said in a post on Telegram that a Russian special service operation ordering his murder, which had allocated a $500,000 bounty to carry out the crime, had successfully been foiled.
It added that it had procured the sum offered to “liquidate” Kapustin by Russia and this money would be used to strengthen Ukrainian drone capabilities against Russian forces.
HUR said that the murder of Kapustin – considered a “personal enemy” by Russian President Vladimir Putin – had been “commissioned by the special services of the aggressor state Russia, which allocated half a million dollars to carry out the crime.”
It added that a special operation lasting more than a month had successfully duped Russian intelligence services into believing that Kapustin was dead.
International Glance
Around 40 people have been killed and 100 injured, most of them seriously, after an explosion tore through a crowded bar during a New Year's Eve party in the upscale ski resort of Crans-Montana, Swiss officials said on Thursday, Jan. 1.
US President Donald Trump and his top aides expressed concern over several Israeli policies in the West Bank during their meetings Monday with visiting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in West Palm Beach, a US official told The Times of Israel.
A turbulent New Year’s Eve unfolded across Russia as multiple regions reported drone attacks in the early hours of Jan. 1, triggering fires at oil facilities in Kaluga Oblast and Krasnodar Krai, according to Russian Telegram channels and monitoring groups.
As the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip stretches on, more and more reports have emerged of growing strains between US President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Putin has claimed the weapons are impossible to intercept because the missile speeds are supposedly more than 10 times the speed of sound.





























