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According to Ukrainian government officials and news sources,President of UkraineVolodymyr Zelenskyy has survived dozens of assassination and kidnapping attempts by Russian or pro-Russian agents during theRussian invasion of Ukraine, including at least three that were foiled by Ukrainian security services.[1][2][3]
According to Ukrainian presidential adviserMykhailo Podolyak, Russia planned to achieve a quick victory during the invasion by sending groups into the Ukrainian capital,Kyiv, toeliminate Ukraine's leadership.[4] He stated that "Russia's key intention [was] to remove the country's top leadership, create maximum panic, and try to establish its ownpuppet government".[5]
According to the Ukrainian government, in early February 2022, Russian presidentVladimir Putin instructed Chechen leaderRamzan Kadyrov to eliminate Ukrainian leaders.[6] In early March, Ukraine intelligence said that Chechen commandos sent to assassinate Zelenskyy had been "eliminated", with help fromFSB agents sympathetic to Ukraine.[7]
In February 2022,Redut PMC was ordered on a covert mission in the Kyiv region to infiltrate and eliminate the political leadership and theUkrainian Secret Service, by storming those institutions.[8] More than one thousand fighters entered the Kyiv region for this purpose,[9] however the mission failed due to the Ukrainian government having prior intel regarding the plan, resulting in Redut losing up to 90% of their fighting force.[10]
More than 400 Russian mercenaries from theWagner Group were reported to have been in Kyiv by late February 2022, with orders to assassinate Zelenskyy and destabilise the government enough for Russia to take control.[11]
Zelenskyy subsequently reported that, during one attempt on his life in 2022, "people were killed inside the presidential office", but did not further describe the attack or whether those killed were Ukrainian security forces and/or would-be assassins.[12]
In August 2023, it was reported that another assassination attempt had been stopped after Ukraine's security service arrested a woman who was suspected of gathering information on Zelenskyy's trip to theMykolaiv Oblast.[13]
In April 2024, a man was arrested inPoland and was allegedly tasked with collecting information aboutRzeszow-Jasionka Airport, which is used by Zelenskyy, alongside possible aid towards Russian intelligence services on an assassination of him.[14]Vasyl Malyuk, thehead of theSBU, reported that the Polish man had been a Russiansleeper agent since the Soviet era, and activated by the FSB with the task of assassinating Zelenskyy, using either a first-person view drone or a sniper rifle at Rzeszow-Jasionka Airport. Polish officials confirmed that the Pole, referred to as "Paweł K.", had been arrested in connection with the plot in April 2024 and indicted in May 2025.[15]
In May 2024, two Ukrainian colonels were arrested for treason in an alleged plot by theFSB to create a network of agents in an attempt to subdue those close to Zelenskyy and eventually take hostage and kill the President. The arrested colonels were members of theState Security Administration, and three FSB members—Maxim Mishustin, Dmytro Perlin and Oleksiy Korne—were identified as those formulating the plot.Kyrylo Budanov, a Ukrainian general, was reported to be the first to be assassinated in the plan, originally to be carried out prior toOrthodox Easter Sunday on May 5; the FSB plot allegedly called for hitting Budanov's house with a missile, finishing off any survivors with drones, and then firing another missile to destroy evidence of the drones.[16][17]
During the conflict there were conflicting accounts of the number of assassination attempts made against Zelenskyy. Presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak referenced the issue while speaking to theUkrainska Pravda news outlet, saying, "Our foreign partners are talking about two or three attempts. I believe that there were more than a dozen attempts".[18]
In addition, on Saturday, 26 February 2022, an assassination attempt by a group ofChechen mercenaries was prevented on the outskirts of Kyiv with the would-be assassins killed.[6]
In early March 2022, the head of Ukraine'sNational Security Council,Oleksiy Danilov, said that Zelenskyy had survived three assassination attempts in one week. Danilov credited the aid of anti-war intelligence officers within Russia's FSB, who shared information with Ukrainian forces about the planned attacks by two groups of assassins from Chechnya.[19]
During an interview withCBS News on 6 March 2022, U.S.secretary of stateAntony Blinken said that the Ukrainian government had prepared for the potential death of Zelenskyy in the invasion, but would not disclose additional details.[20]
Chechen fighters loyal to the Kremlin are being betrayed by Russian spies who are leaking their whereabouts to Ukrainian forces, an aide to President Zelensky has claimed. Aleksei Arestovich said that the FSB was 'quietly passing on' information about the movements of Chechen units.
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