An apparent settling of scores in a town in Alicante has turned to a possible crime against a Russian defector, according to statements yesterday by a Kremlin espionage official. The head of the Russian Foreign Espionage Service, Sergei Narishkin, assured that Maxim Kuzminov, the Russian pilot who defected in a helicopter to Ukraine and who is believed to be the man found dead in the Alicante town of La Vila Joiosa, was a “ traitor". “This traitor and criminal became a moral corpse the moment he planned his dirty and terrible crime,” Narishkin said, according to the official Russian news agency RIA Novosti. Narishkin added: “In Russia it is often said: either one speaks well about the dead or one does not speak at all.”
Since news began to emerge from Ukrainian sources about the possible crime of this pilot, the Civil Guard has modified its investigation. The first thing investigators have done is analyze the fingerprints and DNA of the deceased. He is officially a 33-year-old young man of Ukrainian nationality, but the agents are cross-checking the information with Interpol to officially certify that he is Kuzminov, according to investigation sources.
The case is being handled by the investigating court number 3 of La Vila Joiosa, which was on duty on the day of the crime, last February 13. According to information that has become known in recent days, the victim would be a Russian pilot who defected last August to surrender to the Ukrainian army with the helicopter he was piloting.
According to the initial report from the Civil Guard, the young man received half a dozen gunshot wounds on the ramp of the urbanization where he was staying. Eye sources stated that the vehicle in which the alleged perpetrators fled passed over the body.
Efe reports, citing the Ukrainian media Kyiv Post, that the representative of the Ukrainian military intelligence (GUR), Andrí Yusov, confirmed the death of the pilot, although he did not mention the place where the body was found. A GUR source told another Ukrainian media outlet, Ukrainska Pravda, that the pilot was shot dead and that a burned-out car was found near his home that could have been used by the murderers, the latter of which coincides with what happened in Spain, because Shortly after, the vehicle supposedly used by the attackers in their escape was found on fire.
According to the GUR, Kuzminov had decided to go live in Spain instead of staying in Ukraine. The Russian's defection became known in September last year when the GUR published images in which the pilot, who was 28 years old at the time, explained how he was contacted by enemy military intelligence, who offered him to join the Ukrainian side in exchange. of money and protection.
In the video you can see Kuzminov landing with his helicopter, a Mi-8 combat helicopter, at a military base in the Kharkov region, in eastern Ukraine and on the border with Russia, explains Efe.
As reported at the time by the head of the GUR, Kuzminov crossed the border flying below the radar detection area along with other crew members who did not know of the pilot's plans and who died when they tried to flee after landing.
