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Ukraine president aide's house attacked with Molotov cocktail

AFP WORLD
Published October 22,2021
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Ukrainian police on Friday detained a 25-year-old man who threw a Molotov cocktail at the house of a senior aide to President Volodymyr Zelensky.

The attack on the deputy head of the presidential administration, Igor Zhovkva, was the second in weeks on an aide to Zelensky after gunmen opened fire on a car carrying his senior aide Sergiy Shefir in late September.

Police said in a statement that they detained the 25-year-old about four am local time for throwing a bottle containing a flammable mixture into the courtyard of Zhovkva's house in Kiev.

"Fortunately, neither he nor anyone else was hurt," Zelensky's spokesman Sergiy Nykyforov said on Ukrainian television.

He added that the presidency hopes for the quick identification of those who ordered the attack and their possible motives, as well as "bringing the perpetrators to justice".

Police said the attacker was a homeless man who found an advertisement for the job online offering $4,000 to carry out the attack.

The attack comes exactly one month after more than 10 bullets hit a car carrying Zelensky's advisor Shefir in what officials described as an assassination attempt.

The former scriptwriter and associate of comedian-turned-politician Zelensky escaped unharmed but his driver was injured.

The shooting was one of the most high-profile assassination attempts in Ukraine's modern history and came after the country's 43-year-old leader promised to reboot the political system and tackle the influence of powerful oligarchs.

Officials said the shooting could have been a retaliation for the legislation, while Ukraine's parliament passed the law the next day.