Local authorities reported a car bomb in Russian-controlled territory in Ukraine’s eastern Lugansk region killed an official appointed by Moscow on Monday.
The local branch of Russia’s Investigative Committee said the deputy head of a state-run administrative agency was killed when an “unidentified device detonated in a car.”
Several officials installed by Moscow in eastern Ukraine have been killed in attacks seemingly organized by Kyiv or pro-Kyiv forces since Russia began its military offensive in 2022.
The Investigative Committee issued a photo of an SUV with its windows and doors blown out, including wreckage blasted across the street in Starobilsk, a town in Lugansk.
Municipal head Vladimir Chernev said the victim was Valery Chaika, an official in Lugansk.
“The circumstances of the incident and the people involved in the commission of the crime are being established,” the Investigative Committee said, adding it began a probe into a “terrorist act.”
Lugansk is one of four regions of eastern Ukraine that Russia claimed to annex in 2022.
