Ukraine spy chief’s wife poisoned with ‘heavy metals’ in suspected assassination attempt

The wife of Ukraine’s spy chief was poisoned in a suspected assassination attempt on Tuesday (Nov 28), and is being treated at a hospital.

Marianna Budanova (30), the wife of Lt Gen Kyrylo Budanov (37), who heads Ukrainian military intelligence agency GUR, was poisoned with ‘heavy metals’, Kyiv officials confirmed.

“Marianna Budanova was indeed poisoned by heavy metals. She is now undergoing a course of treatment, which is already coming to an end,” Yusov told Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Ukrainian Service in an interview.

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It is unclear how she was poisoned or who was responsible for it.

There are reports that apart from Budanova, several GUR personnel were also diagnosed with the same poisoning. An official statement with more details is yet to be released by GUR.

Officials launch probe

Ukraine's Babel news site, quoting unnamed intelligence sources, reported that Kyiv had opened an investigation and is considering it as an "attempted murder."

According to Babel, the substances found in her body "are not used in normal life or military affairs."

"Their presence may indicate a deliberate poisoning attempt," it said.

Commenting on the nature of the heavy metals, local media speculated that the metals were not used domestically or in military equipment, so the GUR representatives believethat the poisoning was carried out intentionally, possibly through food or drink.

Ukraine's spy chief survived 10 attempts on life

Let Gen Budanov has often been the subject of targeted attacks as he is considered to be the key man behind planning and sometimes executing major military operations against Russian forces, following Moscow's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

He is said to have survived 10 assassination attempts so far, with the local media pointing towards the role of the FSB, the Russian security agency.

Marianna Budanova, born in 1993 in Kyiv, has a master's degree in psychology. She later became involved in politics, working as an adviser to the mayor of Kyiv, according to BBC.

In 2022, she told Elle magazine that she had also worked as a volunteer in Kyiv's military hospital in 2015-17.

In September, Lt Gen Budanov, 37, told the War Zone website that he and his wife had been staying in his office "since the February invasion" in 2022 for safety reasons.

"She's [Marianna] actually a professor at our national police academy. She's teaching legal psychology. It's not a problem for her as it might have been for someone else."