SLIPPED DOSE OF POISON
Food attack eyed on Ukr. intel big’s wife
The wife of Ukraine’s military intelligence chief has been poisoned with heavy metals that may have been slipped into her food, according to officials.
Marianna Budanova, the university professor wife of Lt. Gen. Kyrylo Budanov, who leads Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence (GUR), is being treated at a hospital, according to the publication Babel.
“Yes, I can confirm the information, unfortunately, it is true,” GUR spokesman Andriy Yusov said, without clarifying when the poisoning happened.
The mystery substances believed to have sickened Budanova “are in no way used in daily activities or in military affairs,” a source within GUR told Babel. “Their presence may indicate a deliberate attempt to poison a specific person.”
The poison likely had been mixed into Budanova’s food, reported the newspaper Ukrainska Pravda, citing sources in the country’s security apparatus.
“She complained of feeling unwell, and that is why they ran some tests that revealed she had been poisoned,” sources were quoted as telling the publication.
Several other GUR operatives had also been poisoned, but Budanova became symptomatic first because she weighs significantly less than the others, Ukrainska Pravda reported.
‘Organs affected’
Valeriy Kondratyuk, the former head of Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service, told independent Russian news outlet Meduza that Budanov confirmed his wife’s poisoning to him Tuesday.
“Some of her organs had been affected,” Kondratyuk revealed. “At this point, the medical treatment has been concluded; her life is not in danger.”
The Ukrainian authorities are investigating the poisoning as an attempted murder, according to RBC Ukraine. Media reports did not make any suggestions of who might be behind the poisoning, or clarify when it occurred.
Kondratyuk floated the idea, without providing evidence, that Russian security services may be the culprit.
Budanov, 37, himself was not harmed and was said to be “in good health.” The military spymaster is said to have survived at least 10 attempts on his life since the start of the war with Russia, a GUR spokesperson said in June.
In an interview with Radio Freedom earlier this year, Budanov said that he and his wife have been living in his office and spending 24 hours a day together for security reasons.
“She’s actually a professor at our national police academy,” Budanov told The War Zone website in September. “She’s teaching legal psychology. It’s not a problem for her as it might have been for someone else.”
Budanov has been portrayed as the mastermind of numerous secret operations targeting Russian President Vladimir Putin’s forces.