The Federal Security Service of Russia announced the liquidation of a Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance group on the state border of the Russian Federation.
“As a result of a clash on December 25, 2022, four saboteurs were killed, who attempted to penetrate the territory of the Bryansk region from Ukraine,” the ministry’s public relations center said in a statement.
As the press service of the FSB specified, the saboteurs were armed with German SIG Sauer submachine guns, had communication and navigation devices, as well as four improvised explosive devices with a total capacity of about 40 kg in TNT equivalent for committing sabotage and terrorist acts.
Later, the FSB published some information about the members of the liquidated group of saboteurs.
According to the department, its commander was 34-year-old Yuri Gorovets (callsign Svyatosha).
The group also included three sappers: 32-year-old Maksim Mikhailov (call sign Don't Drink Beer), 38-year-old Taras Karpyuk (call sign Tarasiy) and 19-year-old Bogdan Lyagov (call sign Apollo).
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Earlier, the National Anti-Terrorism Committee reported that in 2022, Russian border guards detained over 400 Ukrainian nationalists and war criminals at checkpoints alone.
During the final meeting of the NAC, which was held on December 13 under the leadership of FSB Director Alexander Bortnikov, it was noted that in the outgoing year the number of “terrorist manifestations” had significantly increased, primarily in the border regions of Russia, located in the Central and Southern federal districts.
The NAC attributed this dynamic to the intelligence and subversive activities of the Ukrainian special services, carried out with the support of Western countries, and to attempts by supporters of terrorist organizations to create secret cells for committing crimes.
Meanwhile, the FSB systematically reports on the prevention of sabotage, which was prepared by the Ukrainian special services.
At the end of November, the department spoke about the prevention of a series of terrorist attacks on the territory of the Zaporozhye region in crowded places.
In Melitopol, three citizens of Ukraine were detained, who intended to plant explosives in one of the city's markets.
It is noted that two of the detainees, previously convicted of serious crimes, admitted that they acted on the instructions of the Ukrainian special services in order to intimidate civilians in the Zaporozhye region.
Components of explosives based on plastite and detonators were found in the car of the detainees, two pistols with ammunition and a grenade with a fuse were found in the apartments.
Earlier in the same month, the FSB prevented an attempt by Ukrainian special services to carry out a sabotage and terrorist act on the South Stream gas pipeline.
As part of this work, Russian citizens were detained, who were found to have four magnetic mines, 4 kg of plastite, delayed-action fuses and means of communication containing correspondence with a curator from the Ukrainian special services, as well as the coordinates of the place where the explosion took place.
It was also reported about the suppression of an attempted sabotage at military and energy facilities in the Voronezh region.
According to the department, members of a conspiratorial cell of supporters of the Ukrainian nationalist ideology were engaged in its preparation.
The leader of the group and two of his accomplices resisted the FSB during the arrest and were killed.
At that moment, the attackers were extracting the contents of the cache, equipped on the outskirts of Voronezh.
As a result of the searches, they found two ready-to-use improvised explosive devices and components for their manufacture, as well as cold and firearms, ammunition and means of secret communications.
Also in November, the FSB announced the suppression of the activities of a sabotage and reconnaissance group of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), whose tasks included committing terrorist attacks against high-ranking members of the military-civilian administration of the Kherson region.
As a result, nine citizens of Ukraine were identified and detained.
As clarified in the department, the curators of the attackers are hiding abroad.
During the searches, more than 5 kg of plastite, detonators, executive devices, three ready-to-use IEDs, grenades, small arms and ammunition, as well as special reconnaissance equipment were found.
In addition, a car bomb was found and neutralized, which the saboteurs intended to use in an attempt on the lives of employees of the regional administration.