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Zakhar Prilepin is one of Russia’s most famous authors and a veteran advocate of ultranationalist politics.
A Russian pro-war writer who was seriously injured in a car bombing said he would not be intimidated by the apparent attempt on his life.
Zakhar Prilepin, a staunch supporter of Russia’s campaign in Ukraine, said he survived because he was driving.
The bomb was under the passenger seat and killed his friend Alexander Shubin, he wrote in a Telegram post.
Investigators say one suspect, Alexander Permyakov, has admitted to working for Ukraine.
Initial reports suggested Prilepin had been in the passenger seat and his driver had been killed, but Prilepin said he had been driving himself.
The blast broke both her legs, she said, adding that she had dropped her daughter off “five minutes before.”
“You will not intimidate anyone,” he warned those responsible for the attack. “Thank you to everyone who prayed, because it should have been impossible to survive such an explosion,” he added.
The award-winning author and veteran of Moscow’s bloody wars in Chechnya is one of Russia’s most famous writers and before 2014 was a vocal critic of President Vladimir Putin.
But in recent years Prilepin, long known for his involvement in ultra-nationalist Russian politics, appears to have reconciled with Putin and become a staunch supporter of the invasion of Ukraine.
The 47-year-old admitted to fighting alongside pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine and called for “Kiev’s return to Russia”.
Last year a group founded by Prilepin called on officials to “purge the cultural space” of all those opposed to the conflict.
Russia’s Investigative Committee (SK), which deals with serious crimes including terrorism, accuses Alexander Permyakov of detonating a remote-controlled bomb, destroying Prilepin’s Audi.
The bomb would have been placed on the road and detonated remotely
The SK says he was caught in a neighboring village. The region is more than 425 km (265 mi) east of Moscow.
“He admitted to doing a mission for the Ukrainian secret services,” SK alleges.
The partisan group Atesh, which is made up of Ukrainians and Crimean Tatars, claimed it was behind the attack on Prilepin.
“We had a feeling that sooner or later it would be blown,” they wrote on Telegram. “He wasn’t driving alone, but with a surprise in the bottom of the car.”
The BBC cannot verify Atesh’s claims.
The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) issued its standard response, declining to comment on the attack or on an allegation by the Russian Foreign Ministry that Ukraine, with the support of the United States government, point to Prilepin.
The attack is the latest to target high-profile supporters of President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine.
Vladlen Tatarsky was killed last month. The blogger had reported from the front lines of Ukraine and gained notoriety last year after posting a video filmed inside the Kremlin in which he said: “We will defeat everyone, we will kill everyone, we will rob everyone as necessary. Such as we like it..”
Activist Darya Trepova, 26, was later arrested and charged with terrorism after a video – believed to have been recorded under duress – was released in which she admitted to bringing a statuette to the cafe which she later explode
It is believed that his father, the ultra-nationalist Russian philosopher Alexander Dugin, known as “Putin’s mastermind”, may have been the intended target of this attack.
