Russia-backed lawmaker in Ukraine’s Luhansk killed by car bomb

A Russian-backed lawmaker in the city of Luhansk in eastern Ukraine was killed in a car bomb attack on Wednesday, the region’s Russian-backed governor said.
Mikhail Filiponenko, a lawmaker in the Russia-backed Luhansk assembly and a former top security official in the region, died after a bomb planted in a car exploded, a local news agency cited his son as saying.
Filiponenko, who had been active in Luhansk’s pro-Russian separatist movement since 2014, had served as one of the top commanders in the army of the so-called Luhansk People’s Republic.
In September, he was elected to the regional parliament in a vote that drew widespread international condemnation.
Bomb blasts targetting senior Russian-installed officials in parts of Ukraine Moscow claims as its own have been a regular occurence since Russia ordered tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in Feb. 2022.