A teenage suspect has been arrested for the shocking assassination of Iryna Farion, a controversial former Ukrainian lawmaker known for her fiery anti-Russian language stance. The 18-year-old, Viacheslav Zinchenko, was captured after a challenging manhunt and is believed to have connections to Russian neo-Nazi groups. The investigation reveals a tangled web of motives, including a potential plan for more attacks. As details unfold, the intrigue deepens with claims of Zinchenko’s ideological convictions and his ominous farewell letter, hinting at a larger conspiracy.
Ukrainian authorities stated on July 25 that a teenager had been apprehended in connection with the murder of former lawmaker and linguist Iryna Farion, following a “challenging” manhunt.
Since then, information regarding the alleged killer’s likely motivation—including potential ties to Russian neo-Nazi groups—has started to surface reports the Kyiv Independent.
Here is what we currently know:
The Offense
In the western Ukrainian city of Lviv, on the evening of July 19, a man opened fire on Farion from the street outside her residence.
Despite emergency surgery, she was declared dead later that evening.
Farion was a very divisive person in Ukraine, well-known for her provocative remarks against the usage of the Russian language. She was a professor of linguistics who briefly represented the nationalist Svoboda party in the parliament.
When she claimed that Ukrainian soldiers who speak Russian could not legitimately be called Ukrainians at the end of last year, it particularly infuriated people.
She was harshly chastised for sharing an email on social media that contained a supportive message from Maksym Hlebov, a pro-Ukrainian student residing in occupied Crimea, and disclosing his private information.
The Security Service (SBU) of Ukraine announced in November 2023 that Farion was the subject of a criminal investigation for her remarks toward soldiers who spoke Russian as well as for disclosing the Hlebov communication.
The Accused
Viacheslav Zinchenko, age 18, was taken into custody on July 25 in Dnipro, which is located around 1,000 kilometers east of Lviv.
According to Ukrainian media, his father is fighting on the front lines. When reached, all he said was that his son was a Ukrainian patriot.
Zinchenko is a soccer player for a local minor team, according to Slidstvo.Info, a Ukrainian news outlet. Far-right accounts were purportedly subscribed to his purported social media account. He apparently enrolled as a distant student at a nearby university to study law after graduating from high school last year.
The mother of the suspect informed reporters that her son had “spent a long time there last year,” attending a drone operator course at a nearby school, so he was familiar with Lviv. She stated that he wished to enlist as a volunteer in the military.
Pursuit and Recognition
President Volodymyr Zelensky announced the news on Telegram, citing Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko and stating that the manhunt had been “challenging.”
“Over the past few days, hundreds of specialists from the National Police of Ukraine, the Security Service of Ukraine, and other services worked to solve the murder,” Zelensky said.
According to Klymenko, the search took 139 hours to complete. Following an examination of over 100 hectares of forest, law enforcement officials were able to locate the alleged shooter in Dnipro.
“With his photo, it was a matter of time: smart surveillance cameras ‘caught’ him everywhere,” Klymenko said.
Zinchenko’s details were released to the media by Ukrainian law enforcement prior to his official designation as a suspect in the assassination.
Experts interviewed by the Ukrainian media watchdog Detector Media said that these kinds of conduct violated both the law and morality.
A Lviv court detained Zinchenko for sixty days on July 26. The inquiry is still ongoing.
BREAKING
— GreatGameInternational (@GreatGameIndia) July 25, 2024
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Supposed Reason
Zinchenko doesn’t say whether or not he was involved in the murder in a video that was made public by the National Police.
“We will see. Time will show,” he replies when asked whether he killed Farion.
Andrii Niebytov, the deputy head of the Ukrainian National Police, stated in an interview with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty on July 26 that Zinchenko thinks he “did the right thing.”
“There’s a person, a totally pro-Ukrainian person. I have personally spoken with him. He respects Ukraine. His father is fighting in a brigade,” he said.
“He loves Ukraine and thinks he did the right thing. He thinks Ukrainian society should not be divided. He had his own motives.”
Niebytov further implied that Zinchenko was not acting alone when he devised the plan for the murder.
“I’ll put it this way: this person hasn’t come up with this idea by himself,” he said.
“You know that he was a member of certain groups that unfortunately weren’t pro-Ukrainian.”
Law enforcement officials in Ukraine stated on July 26 that Zinchenko might have ties to the Russian neo-Nazi movement.
“Secret Instructions of the Central Intelligence Agency and the Committee for State Security on Fact-Gathering, Conspiracy and Disinformation” was a digital book that was found on Zinchenko’s phone, they claimed.
The names of additional lawmakers and deputies as well as the regional council meeting calendar were found in the suspect’s search history on his devices, which may suggest he had more attacks on authorities planned.
According to the pro-Kremlin Telegram channel Readovka, Farion’s murder was committed by the NS/WP (National-Socialism/White Power) organization. Additionally, Readovka called the NS/WP “neo-Nazi.”
According to a police spokeswoman, the allegations made on Russian social media were being looked into by the Ukrainian police.
In another letter that Zinchenko wrote to his father before leaving, he begged to clarify that he had “hidden everything from him for his safety, not because he did not trust him.”
BREAKING
— GreatGameInternational (@GreatGameIndia) July 20, 2024
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