By Kateryna Zakharchenko

Copyright kyivpost

A court in the Moscow region has ordered the arrest of businessman Araik Amirkhanyan, accused of being an accomplice in the murder of former Verkhovna Rada deputy Ilya Kyva in December 2023, law enforcement agencies told TASS.

“The Moscow Regional Court has chosen pre-trial detention for the accomplice in the murder of [Ilya] Kiva, Araik Amirkhanyan,” a source said to Russian media.

According to the source, Amirkhanyan had already been in custody in connection with another criminal case.

On Dec. 6, 2023, Kiva was shot multiple times by an unidentified assailant while walking in the Moscow suburbs and died at the scene. Russian media reported that his body was discovered near a house outside Moscow.

Illia Kyva, a former lawmaker in Ukraine’s parliament from the now-banned pro-Russian party “Opposition Platform – For Life,” had defected to Russia at the beginning of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. He became a frequent guest on Russian television, where he supported the invasion, urged Ukrainians to surrender, and portrayed Russia’s war as a “necessary liberation.”

Ukrainian intelligence later claimed responsibility for the killing. A source in the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) told Kyiv Post it was a special operation, calling Kyva “a top traitor, collaborator and propagandist.”

HUR spokesman Andriy Yusov also confirmed his death, adding: “Such a fate will await other traitors of Ukraine.”

Kyiv Post reached out to the SBU for comment but did not receive a response as of the time of publication.