Moscow: In a car bombing that killed his driver on Saturday and injured renowned Russian nationalist author Zakhar Prilepin, the latter of whom admitted acting on behalf of Ukraine, according to investigators.

Three days prior to the attack, the Kremlin claimed Ukraine had attempted to hit the building with drones; Ukraine denied any involvement in the attack.

The latest assault on the author, an ardent supporter of Moscow's military campaign in Ukraine, was blamed by Russia's Foreign Ministry on both Ukraine and the Western nations supporting it, particularly the United States.

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The standard response from the Ukrainian security services was a refusal to confirm or deny involvement. A high-ranking Ukrainian official charged that Russia staged the incident.

Prilepin's Audi Q7 was blown up in a village in the Nizny Novgorod region, about 400 kilometres (250 miles) east of Moscow, according to the Russian Investigative Committee, which is treating the incident as a terrorist act. According to the report, Prilepin was taken to a hospital.

The white car was seen in the committee's image lying on its side next to a wooded track, with a large crater beside it and scraps of metal all around it.

Later, the committee released a statement claiming that Alexander Permyakov, a suspect, was being questioned by detectives.

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The statement was read aloud by a woman in uniform and stated, "The suspect was detained and, in the course of questioning, he provided testimony that he acted on the instructions of the Ukrainian special services."

Gleb Nikitin, the governor of the Nizhny Novgorod region, posted on Telegram that Prilepin had undergone a successful operation and was now being sedated to aid in his recovery.

According to a statement on the Russian Foreign Ministry's website, "Responsibility for this and other terrorist acts lies not only with Ukrainian authorities, but also with their Western patrons, most notably the United States."

According to the report, Washington's failure to condemn these and other assaults was "self-revealing" for the US government.

Security sources told the state-run news agency TASS that the suspect was a "native of Ukraine" with a prior conviction for armed robbery.
The SBU Security Service of Ukraine issued its customary statement in which it declined to confirm or deny any involvement in the bombing.

The attack was staged, according to Mykhailo Podolyak, a top adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Everyone is aware that this entire event is staged, Podolyak said to Ukrainian television. The Kremlin bombings are staged and targeted at domestic audiences, according to the statement.

Since Moscow's all-out invasion of its neighbour in February 2022, the novelist was the third prominent pro-war figure to be bombed.
Journalist Darya Dugina and war blogger Vladlen Tatarsky were killed in the previous two attacks, and Russia has accused Ukraine of being responsible; Kyiv has denied any involvement.

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Whom "in the pantheon of Russian scum propagandists" should be targeted next after Dugina, Tatarsky, and Prilepin was the question posed in an online poll by the Ukrainian news outlet UNIAN.

Requests for comment from officials at the White House, Pentagon, and State Department were not immediately fulfilled. The British Foreign Office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.