Spanish authorities said that an advisor to former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych was shot dead on Wednesday when gunmen targeted him outside the American School of Madrid.
Andrii Portnov, 51, was identified as the victim by Spain’s Interior Ministry. He was shot at 9:15 a.m. local time (0715 GMT), authorities said, after apparently dropping his children off for class.
Witnesses reported that Portnov was shot “several times” in the head and body by more than one gunman when he was getting into his car, a black Mercedes Benz, police said. The assailants then fled on foot.
Madrid’s emergency services said that he was found dead when medics arrived with at least three shots to his body.
Portnov is a former Ukrainian politician closely tied to Yanukovych, having served as deputy head of the presidential office from 2010 to 2014.
During Yanukovych’s presidency, Portnov was widely viewed as a pro-Russia political figure and was involved in drafting legislation aimed at persecuting participants of the 2014 revolution in Ukraine.
Luis Rayo, 19, who lives in a building next to the school, said that he was sleeping when he heard the sound of gunfire.
“I heard five bullets and then came here to see what happened,” Rayo said.
Police cordoned off a crime scene in a parking lot around 150 metres (500 feet) outside the gate of the American School of Madrid, located in the upscale Pozuelo de Alarcón neighborhood north of the city center.
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Parents told The Associated Press that Portnov had children studying at the private school. The school declined to confirm whether his children were enrolled.
Timur Ayaokur, 17, said he was 20 minutes into his first class of the day when he and his classmates heard of the shooting. After a few minutes, the school’s administrators told students that a man had been shot and pronounced dead outside.
“I thought it was a drill,” Ayaokur, who is in 11th grade, said of the initial announcement. “I was worried because at first I thought it might be a parent of someone I know.”
His mother Elina Ayaokur, originally from Azerbaijan, said she knew the victim through the Russian community though she did not know him well.
“I didn’t know there were Ukrainian politicians there,” Ayaokur said, adding that the victim had a son in the 4th grade.
“I was in shock, like how is it possible that this happens here?” Ayaokur said.
After fleeing Ukraine in 2014, Portnov reportedly lived in Russia in 2015 before relocating to Austria. It wasn’t immediately clear when he moved to Spain.
In 2018, Ukraine’s Security Service, or SBU, opened an investigation against him on suspicion of state treason, alleging his involvement in Russia’s illegal annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. The criminal case was closed in 2019.
In 2021, the United States imposed personal sanctions on Portnov, designating him as someone “responsible for or complicit in, or (who) has directly or indirectly engaged in, corruption, including the misappropriation of state assets, the expropriation of private assets for personal gain, corruption related to government contracts or the extraction of natural resources, or bribery.”
—Joseph Wilson reported from Barcelona, Spain. Illia Novikov contributed to this report from Kyiv, Ukraine.
© 2025 The Canadian Press
