KYIV -- A Chechen man whom Russian authorities accuse of plotting to kill President Vladimir Putin was shot and wounded in Kyiv in what Ukrainian police say was an assassination attempt.
The Ukrainian Interior Ministry said Adam Osmayev was shot late on June 1 by a man who had introduced himself a day earlier as a French journalist and asked for an interview.
When Osmayev and his wife, Amina Okuyeva, were in a car with the man, he pulled out a pistol and shot Osmayev twice, the ministry said.
Okuyeva then shot the assailant with her own gun, it said. Both men were hospitalized in serious condition.
Osmayev, a native of Russia's Chechnya region who was educated in Britain, was arrested in Ukraine in February 2012 and charged with illegal explosives possession, damaging private property, and forgery. At the request the Russian authorities, he was later charged with plotting to kill Putin.
In November 2014, after Russia's seizure of Crimea and support for separatists in eastern Ukraine severely damaged relations between Moscow and Kyiv, Ukrainian authorities dropped the attempted assassination charge against Osmayev and sentenced him to time served in pretrial detention after convicting him of other crimes.
Both Osmayev and Okuyeva have subsequently fought on the side of Kyiv's forces against the Russia-backed separatists in a conflict that has killed more than 9,900 people since April 2014.
