Car bomb kills Russia general

A RUSSIAN general was killed yesterday in a car bombing in Moscow, the third such hit on military top brass in a year.

- BY CHRIS HUGHES Defence and Security Editor

War veteran Lt Gen Fanil Sarvarov, 56, head of the armed forces' operational training department, died in hospital from his injuries, Russian officials said.

Svetlana Petrenko, spokesman for Russia's criminal investigation agency, said: "Investigators are pursuing numerous lines of inquiry regarding the murder.

"One of these is that the crime was orchestrated by Ukrainian intelligence services."

Images from the scene, a car park near an apartment block in the south of the capital, show a badly damaged white Kia Sorento with its doors blown off.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said President Vladimir Putin had been immediately informed of the killing of one of his officers.