Woman suspected of Monaco bombing found shot dead near Kyiv

A woman suspected of carrying out last week’s bomb attack in Monaco that seriously injured a Ukraine-born business tycoon has been found shot dead near Kyiv, in the latest twist in a case that has shaken the wealthy Mediterranean principality.

Ukrainian prosecutors said on Tuesday the woman had been found with a gunshot wound to the head and that two men had been arrested in connection with the case, including an officer with Ukraine’s military intelligence agency (HUR) and a former law enforcement officer.

On Friday, Interpol issued a red notice for 39-year-old Anastasiia Berezovska, a Ukrainian national who speaks German. The notice – a request to law enforcement agencies worldwide to locate and provisionally arrest a suspect pending extradition – said Berezovska was wanted by Monaco on charges of attempted murder, placing an explosive device in a public place with criminal intent, and criminal conspiracy.

Prosecutors said in a statement that Berezovska received cryptocurrency payments from the two men who were later arrested, leading investigators to treat them as “individuals potentially involved in the attempted murder in Monaco”. They added that the serving HUR officer was “acting on his own initiative” and did not inform his superiors about his contacts with Berezovska.

Prosecutors also released footage showing a blood-stained “torture chamber”, containing hammers and other equipment, which they said was discovered during searches of the men’s properties.

The Guardian could not independently verify the prosecutors’ account.

The affair could prove politically costly for Kyiv. Any evidence linking members of Ukraine’s intelligence services to a bombing on European soil would be deeply damaging, coming as President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrived at a Nato summit on Tuesday seeking to shore up western support while Russia continues its deadly bombardment of Ukrainian cities.

Prince Albert II of Monaco previously condemned the bombing as “an odious act” and said all the principality’s security services had been mobilised.

The victims have not been officially identified, but police and judicial sources told French media they were Vadym Iermolaiev, 58, a businessman originally from Ukraine who now holds Cypriot citizenship, his girlfriend and their son. Iermolaiev and his partner were taken to hospital with serious injuries, while the child sustained minor injuries.

French prosecutors allege Berezovska, who had been living in Germany, disguised herself as a man before placing an explosive device in the entrance hall of the family’s apartment building in Monaco.

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Iermolaiev had been living in Monaco as part of a group of wealthy Ukrainian businessmen and politicians that independent Ukrainian media labelled the “Monaco battalion”.

Ukraine imposed sanctions on Iermolaiev in 2023, alleging he had maintained business links with Russian entities operating in Ukrainian territories occupied by Moscow, including Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014.

Monaco’s deputy prosecutor said last week that the suspected attacker fled the principality on foot into neighbouring France before travelling by car to Germany via several European countries, including Italy.

Ukraine has carried out numerous lethal operations involving explosive devices against senior Russian military officers and Kremlin-backed Ukrainian officials inside Russia, but there is no established precedent for such attacks on European territory.

Last week, German prosecutors accused Ukrainian “state authorities” of ordering the 2022 explosives attack on the Nord Stream gas pipelines linking Russia with Europe.