"Thanks to this operation we were able to foil a cynical plot and document how the Russian security service was planning for this crime," security service head Vasyl Grytsak said at the press conference. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko later met Babchenko and wrote triumphantly on Facebook that "millions of people are celebrating" the journalist's new lease of life. The planned attack was "organised from Russian territory" with the aim of "destabilising the situation in Ukraine" and "killing one whom Russia fears most of all", he said. "Thanks to Arkady and the Ukrainian security chiefs, for not allowing this scenario to be carried out in our country." And Russian investigative journalist Andrei Soldatov, a former colleague of Babchenko, also questioned the value of the operation.

Source: The Nation Bangkok May 31, 2018 07:45 UTC