Leif Green

This is Denys Kireyev (Денис Борисович Кірєєв) - Ukrainian banker, intelligence officer, and unsung savior of Ukraine. Kireyev warned the Ukrainian military about a full-scale Russian invasion as early as fall 2021. On February 23rd, 2022, the day before the invasion, he obtained information that Antonov Airport would be the target of the main attack of the Russian invasion. The Russians planned to use that airport to base their warplanes and thereby dominate the airspace and take Kyiv in less than 48 hours. It was a solid plan. Kireyev was able to pass this information to the Ukrainian military in time for them to redeploy troops to the airport, temporarily fend off the initial attack, and destroy the runway so that Russian aircraft could not use it. His foresight, courage, and action literally saved Ukraine. Were it not for Denys Kireyev, Kyiv likely would have fallen within days of the February 24th invasion. After thwarting the initial thrust of the Russian invasion, Kireyev joined the 28 February peace negotiations in Gomel, Belarus, at the invitation of General Kyrylo Budanov, Chief of the Main Intelligence Service of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry (HUR). Kireyev was also slated to participate in the next round of peace negotiations. Days later, on March 5th, 2022, Denys Kireyev entered a vehicle with Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) officers. Those officers then shot him in the head and dumped his body into the streets of Kyiv. Initial reports by the SBU claimed that Kireyev was a Russian spy and that he was killed while trying to escape arrest. The Kyiv Post later refuted that story: “On March 5, almost immediately after the murder, news outlet Ukrainska Pravda, citing law enforcement agencies, reported that the SBU had eliminated a Russian agent during his detention. However, Budanov said in the interview with Radio Svoboda that this was an attempt to protect those who had killed Kireyev. At the time, the media reported that the banker was shot dead during his detention in the center of Kyiv, near St. Sophia Cathedral. Kireyev’s bodyguards, however, said that no one had resisted the SBU officers. For his part, Budanov said that Kireyev had been summoned from the office of the head of the HUR, accompanied by two internal security officers. ‘About 200 meters from the central building of the SBU, a bus drove out, that is, it just ran into the oncoming traffic, and Alpha troops [the SBU’s special forces] ran out shouting: ‘It’s the SBU!’ Operatives came out and said they were from the SBU,’ Budanov told Radio Svoboda. ‘Kireyev told his bodyguards… that they were SBU officers who wanted to ask him something. Then he was transferred to a minibus, which did not go to this central building, but a few blocks away. Then the incident happened... And his body fell out of that minibus. These are the facts. Why didn’t they go to the SBU building? Let the DBR [State Bureau of Investigation] investigation answer this question,’ Budanov added.’” According to an article in Meduza, “Subsequently, the office of the President of Ukraine stated that the intelligence officer was killed because in the first days of the war, there was ‘no unified coordination’ between the country's security agencies.” I find it worthy of note that the head of the SBU at the time was Ivan Bakanov. I am not going to spell out his significance here, but his name will be quite familiar to you if you follow Ukrainian politics. If you don’t know who he is but you are curious, look him up. Anyway, no one I know is singing Denys Kireyev’s song. Why do you think that might be? In my view, our neglect of this hero is a travesty of the truth. So I guess it falls on me to honor him. Rest in Peace, Denys Kireyev. You were a true hero. You served your country well. You served humanity well. I hope justice for your murder is served someday. May God bless you in eternity and may God bless Ukraine now and forever. Amen.