Poland arrests a suspect in daylight killing of a Russian artist critical of Putin

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WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Polish authorities have arrested a man suspected of fatally shooting in broad daylight a Russian activist critical of President Vladimir Putin and believe there is a likely link to a foreign intelligence service, top officials said Thursday.

The killing is the latest act which Polish authorities believe could be part of a campaign of Russian sabotage in NATO nations aimed at sowing fear and demoralizing Ukraine's closest allies.

The suspect in Monday's killing in Poland is a 36-year-old man who carried a passport belonging to the ex-Soviet republic of Georgia, Interior Minister Marcin Kierwiński said at a news conference in Warsaw.

Kierwiński said the man is suspected of links to organized crime and is being linked by police to other crimes committed in Poland, including those dating to 2022.

Robert Kuzovkov, known by the pseudonym Semyon Skrepetsky, was killed near his home in the eastern Polish city of Biala Podlaska, a city near the border with Belarus. Polish police say the victim was 44 years old.

Prosecutors said the perpetrator fired two shots at him, then shot him three more times at close range before fleeing. Kuzovkov died at the scene of gunshot wounds to the head, chest and back.

“We consider it possible that foreign intelligence services may have been involved,” said Tomasz Siemoniak, Poland’s security services minister, who spoke at the press conference alongside the interior minister.

“Foreign services sometimes hire criminals to carry out operations. We have seen this in previous years. While those cases did not involve murder, criminals were hired to conduct assaults in other countries. We are therefore taking this possibility very seriously,” Siemoniak said.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Wednesday that the killing has the hallmarks of a political assassination.

“Everything points to this being a political murder,” Tusk said, adding: "if that was the case — if it was ordered by Russia — then it is an extremely serious matter internationally. It would constitute state terrorism.”

Polish investigators initially detained two Belarusian citizens but released them later, saying they had no evidence that they were directly involved in the killing.

Polish prosecutors said the Russian activist used his art to express criticism of Russian authorities.

He painted unflattering portraits of Putin, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov and other high-ranking Russian officials. One depicts Putin being cradled in the arms of the Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.

On Sunday, he posted a video on his YouTube channel showing him in Berlin putting a Russian flag in a trash can on June 12, the holiday marking Russia’s sovereignty.

Since it invaded Ukraine in 2022, Russia has been accused of trying to assassinate its opponents abroad, including targeting exiled activists in France and Lithuania.

Officials in Germany have also broken up plots targeting the head of a German weapons supplier to Ukraine and a Ukrainian military official.

Polish authorities arrested a man in 2024 in what they said was a plot to assassinate Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. That same year, a Russian helicopter pilot who defected was killed in Spain, with Russian operatives as the prime suspects.