The head of a Russian cultural center in the Central African Republic was taken to hospital in the capital Bangui on Friday after an assassination attempt, the Russian Embassy said.
A spokesperson for the Russian Embassy said Dmitry Syty, head of the “Russian House” culture center, had opened a mail bomb addressed to him on Friday morning.
The package from an anonymous sender exploded, injuring him seriously.
The embassy said it had tightened its own security measures following the attack, TASS reported.
Meanwhile, the founder of the Russian private military company Wagner accused France of being behind an assassination attempt on the Russian official.
“Before losing consciousness, Dmitry Syty managed to say: ‘I saw a note: This is for you from all the French, the Russians will get out of Africa’,” Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, said in a statement posted on Telegram.
“I have already applied to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation to initiate the procedure for declaring France a state sponsor of terrorism, as well as a thorough investigation of the terrorist methods of France and its Western allies – the United States and others,” Prigozhin said.
