Russian Lieutenant General Fanil Sarvarov head of the Operational Training Directorate at the General Staff has been killed in a car bomb explosion in southern Moscow on December 22, Investigative Committee spokeswoman Svetlana Petrenko told state media.

His parked car exploded at 12 Yasenevaya Street at around 07:00 Moscow time, first responders told TASS. Emergency services attended the scene.

Sarvarov, 56, died immediately from injuries sustained in the explosion, according to Petrenko, according to images seen by IntelliNews.

Local police investigators are pursuing several theories regarding the attack. One possibility is that Ukrainian special services organised the crime, Petrenko stated.

The Russian Investigative Committee's Moscow department has opened a criminal case. The crime scene is under inspection. Witnesses are being interviewed, and surveillance camera recordings are being analysed. The Investigative Committee's central apparatus is monitoring the investigation.

According to the Myrotvorets Centre, a Kyiv-based intelligence website, the Russian official was a target of Kyiv for several years.

The website, which calls itself “Non-government Centre for Research of Elements of Crimes against the National Security of Ukraine, Peace, Humanity, and the International Law," had his name listed before he died in Moscow. 

Sarvarov's personal data appeared on the site on May 28, 2022. His profile described him as a "Russian war criminal," with December 22 marked as his "liquidation date."

One Russian investigative theory suggests Ukrainian special services were involved in the crime.

The Myrotvorets website has published data since 2014 on journalists, militiamen from the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics and other people considered "traitors to the homeland" in Ukraine, Russian cultural figures and citizens of different countries.

In spring 2016, the site posted lists of journalists, including Russian correspondents, who were accredited in the disputed Donetsk and Luhansk.

Some subsequently received threats. Dunja Mijatovic, then OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, called the publication "a worrying step that could further endanger the safety of journalists".