On July 16, the Ukrainian branch of the United States-founded group The Base claimed responsibility for the assassination of Colonel Ivan Voronych of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).
The Base is an organization founded in the United States in 2018 by Rinaldo Nazzaro, a former FBI and Pentagon contractor who has lived in Russia since 2019. It promotes white supremacist and neo-Nazi ideology, and functions primarily as a paramilitary training network, though it has also been linked to direct actions, including synagogue vandalism. The group recruits internationally, operates in decentralized cells, and encourages violent actions against governments and infrastructure. It has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States, United Kingdom, European Union, New Zealand, and Australia.
Voronych was killed on July 10 in Kyiv. According to law enforcement, a man approached the officer around 9 a.m. and fired five shots before fleeing. Voronych was pronounced dead at the scene. Authorities initially withheld the victim’s identity, though an SBU source later confirmed it to Ukrainska Pravda.
As mentioned above, The Base claimed responsibility for the assassination, nearly a week after a joint investigation by the SBU and National Police had been launched. Ukrainian authorities stated that the individuals involved—a man and a woman—were later killed by the SBU. Investigators believe the pair acted under orders from Russia’s Federal Security Service, having tracked Voronych’s movements and accessed a weapons cache containing a silenced firearm.