Former Azarov adviser Zavorotnyi seriously wounded in Moscow car bombing

A bomb exploded under a car in Moscow's southern Chertanovo district on 13 November, seriously wounding 72-year-old Serhii Zavorotnyi. He is a former adviser to Mykola Azarov, who served as Ukraine's prime minister under President Viktor Yanukovych. Russian Telegram channels Mash and Baza reported the incident, and Russia's Investigative Committee has opened a criminal case. The blast came a day after a remote-detonated car bomb killed a Russian colonel near St. Petersburg.

How the blast happened

The Toyota exploded on Kirovogradskaya Street. According to Mash, the device was attached to the underside of the car on the driver's side and went off while Zavorotnyi was driving. Baza said the main version is that the car had been mined, and that the explosion took place about 500 metres from his home.

Mash reported that he got out of the car himself before being taken to hospital. He was later in intensive care in critical condition. Russian state news agency RIA Novosti, citing the Investigative Committee, said the incident is being treated as attempted murder by a dangerous method.

Who Zavorotnyi is

Zavorotnyi was Azarov's press secretary while Azarov headed Ukraine's government. After Azarov fled to Russia following the 2014 Euromaidan revolution and announced a "government in exile" in Moscow, Zavorotnyi stayed in that role, according to a US Senate report. In Russia he ran the pro-Russian website "Antifascist" and accused Ukraine's Security Service of terrorism. He also co-wrote a book about the Yanukovych period and heads the IT center of a state agricultural university in Russia's Primorsky Krai.

In 2020, a US Senate committee named him an officer of Russia's foreign intelligence service, the SVR, involved in influence operations.

Wider context

Since late 2024, bombings and shootings far from the front have killed Russian generals, officers and collaborators. Kyiv sometimes claims such attacks and sometimes leaves them unexplained. This time no one has claimed the blast, and Kyiv has not commented.