Former Ukrainian politician shot dead outside Madrid school
Unidentified gunmen have shot and killed a former Ukrainian politician, Andriy Portnov, outside a school in an upmarket suburb of Madrid.
The killing of Portnov, who had worked as a senior aide to Ukraine's pro-Russian former president, Viktor Yanukovych, took place on Wednesday morning outside the American School of Madrid in Pozuelo de Alarcón.
Authorities said he had been targeted when he was getting into his car, a black Mercedes-Benz. 'Several persons shot him in the back and the head and then fled towards a forested area,' said a source at Spain's interior ministry.
Local media said Portnov had been dropping off his children at the school, where classes had begun 30 minutes before the shooting. He was found dead when medics arrived and had sustained at least three shots to his body, according to Madrid's emergency services.
Police cordoned off the car park of the private school, while helicopters and drones circled above, searching for the suspected killers.
Widely seen as a pro-Russia political figure, Portnov, 52, had been involved in drafting legislation targeting participants of the 2014 revolution in Ukraine before Yanukovych was ousted by a popular uprising.
Portnov fled Ukraine shortly afterwards. In 2015, he was reportedly living in Russia and later relocated to Austria. In recent years, he had been the subject of multiple investigations.
In 2018, Ukraine's security service SBU opened an investigation against him on suspicion of state treason, alleging Portnov was involved in Russia's illegal annexation of the Crimean peninsula. The criminal case was closed in 2019.
In 2021, the US Treasury department imposed sanctions upon him, alleging that 'Portnov took steps to control the Ukrainian judiciary, influence associated legislation, sought to place loyal officials in senior judiciary positions, and purchase court decisions'.
Portnov, who was also the subject of European Union sanctions that were later dropped, appeared to have been living in Madrid since at least April 2024, according to a report by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
Since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Spain has been the scene of several high-profile crimes involving Russians and Ukrainians.
In 2022, six letter bombs were sent to targets across the country, including Spain's prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, the Ukrainian and US embassies, and government offices. A retired Spanish civil servant, who opposed western support for Ukraine after Russia's invasion, was later found guilty of terrorism and manufacturing explosives.
In February 2024, a Russian helicopter pilot who had defected to Ukraine one year earlier in a secret operation was found dead from gunshot wounds in a parking garage near the coastal city of Alicante.
Wednesday's shooting marked the second high-profile shooting in Madrid in as many years; in 2023, the Spanish rightwing politician and former vice-president of the European parliament, Alejo Vidal-Quadras, survived after being shot in the face by a masked gunman in a wealthy Madrid neighbourhood. Police later arrested five people in connection with the shooting, though the suspected gunman – a French national of Tunisian origin with several previous convictions in France – remains at large.
With contributions from the Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters
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