A rare act of violence has jolted Monaco, where a parcel bomb seriously injured a Ukrainian-born businessman, his wife, and their 13-year-old child. Authorities say the device exploded in the lobby of a luxury residential building around 9pm on Monday, in what Monaco's minister of state, Christophe Mirmand, called an unprecedented incident for the city-state, per the Guardian. The explosive reportedly contained bolts and buckshot, and four other people were treated for shock and minor injuries from shattered glass, per Mirmand, who added that "it appears that the family was specifically targeted," reports the AP.
The FranceInfo outlet quotes prosecutor Stephane Thibault as saying someone had dropped a package of some sort off in the building's lobby before the explosion. French media IDed the businessman as Vadym Iermolaiev (also spelled Yermolaiev), a property and industrial magnate originally from Dnipro who once ranked among Ukraine's wealthiest, per the Guardian. Iermolaiev later took Cypriot citizenship and was sanctioned by Ukraine in 2023 over alleged business ties with Russian entities in occupied territories.
CCTV images show a suspect in a dark top and bucket hat escaping toward the French border, and Monaco says all security services have been mobilized. Prince Albert II denounced the bombing as "an odious act," while residents told local media the blast in the normally quiet enclave had left them "in shock." Thibault told reporters that police have launched an attempted-murder probe, though it doesn't rank as a terrorism investigation, per the AP. Thibault notes that Iermolaiev's wife was said to have suffered life-threatening injuries, while Iermolaiev is no longer in danger of losing his life, nor is their son.
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