Ukraine‘s spy chief has revealed a secretive assassination campaign “possibly” being carried out by the country’s intelligence service to target pro-Kremlin collaborators.

In an hour-long TV interview with national broadcaster ICTV, the SBU’s senior officer Lieutenant General Vasyl Malyuk said Ukrainian agents had targeted “very many” people responsible for war crimes and attacks against the country’s citizens.

He provided an unexpected insight into an assassination campaign – carried out through networks of agents and clandestine operatives, assassinating Ukrainians collaborating with Russia to arrest and torture their countrymen and women.

Malyuk said Ukraine could not formally take responsibility the killings, saying: “Officially, we will not admit to this. But at the same time I can offer some details.”

The spy boss told the channel that once intelligence has been confirmed, the SBU is sanctioned by civilian authorities to carry out the assassination.

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Malyuk said the Ukrainian intelligence service would not take credit for the alleged hit on Tatarsky, but he deserved it after his repeated abuse of Ukrainian prisoners of war, the outlet report.

He also addressed the killing of Ukrainian MP Ilya Kyva, who he said had been convicted of treason and was collaborating with Russia‘s FSB when he was shot and killed by an assassin at close range.

Ukrainian citizen Zakhar Prelepin, a senior police official in a “separatist” government backed by the Kremlin in Ukraine‘s Luhansk region was also targeted in an apparent car bomb attack in May last year, but survived.

Malyuk said Prelepin had publicly called for the murder of Ukrainians, and that the had attack left him with severe injuries to his midsection.