A UKRAINIAN female powerlifting champion was sent behind enemy lines to assassinate a top official, Russia claims.

Yulia Lemeshchenko, 41, was one of four women agents detained by the Russian FSB security service as it cracked down on alleged spies sent by Kyiv.

Lemeshchenko was forced to appear in a Russian confession video where she supposedly admitted to being a spy – likely under extreme duress.

In the video, released by Moscow, the Ukrainian supposedly admitted she moved to Russia in 2024 to allegedly assassinate a top official before being detained at her flat in Voronezh city in mid-January.

It is unclear why the Russians have only now revealed her custody – but the secret service embarrassingly admitted that Lemeshchenko had a Russian passport.

It is not clear if Putin’s goons were forcing Lemeshchenko into saying the words or whether she said them of her own free will following her arrest.

It’s a common tactic for Putin’s puppets to force prisoners to confess to made-up crimes under extreme duress.

In the video, Lemeshchenko made the wild claims she was a spy for Ukraine.

She says: “In 2023, I was recruited by the Ukrainian security services.

“I was trained in Kyiv and acquired skills in handling small arms, operating drones, evading surveillance, and making explosive devices.

“My handler gave me the alias Luffy.

“In 2024, I arrived in Russia and, on the instructions of Ukrainian special services, was [ordered] to commit a terrorist act against a high-ranking serviceman from the Russian Defence Ministry.”

Lemeshchenko squatted 130kgs, benched 77.5kgs, and deadlifted 170kgs in the Ukrainian Classic Powerlifting Championships, according to Open Powerlifting.

She was a 2021 Ukrainian winner in the Classic Powerlifting Championship, securing three gold medals.

All four women detained by the FSB had been trained “in handling firearms and bombs, drone control and outdoor surveillance”, the FSB claimed – without providing evidence.

Another female agent was allegedly recruited two years ago and deployed to Rostov-on-Don on a “mission to kill”.

One more was assigned to snoop on top officials and sent to Sevastopol in Russian-occupied Crimea, the FSB claimed – again, without evidence.

First she had to pass a polygraph test in Kyiv.

In January, Russia arrested a kettlebell lifting champion who had allegedly shot a spy in the head.

Vladimir Feshchenko, 26, a senior lieutenant, was killed by a bullet to the head in the mysterious shooting.

The killer was allegedly a more junior warrant officer who was visiting him in his office in a defence ministry building.

Feshchenko – a Russian champion in kettlebell lifting as well as a secret services officer – is believed to have worked at the FSB Directorate for the Moscow Military District.

It comes as US president Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin spoke about ending Russia’s invasion of the country.

The US president claimed mad Vlad “does care” about ending the conflict – and wants to “see people stop dying”.

January was the second bloodiest month for Russia since the start of the war nearly three years ago and there have been more than 837,000 Russian casualties since the invasion.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Sunday he could “neither confirm nor deny” reports of a conversation between Putin and Trump, Russian state news agency TASS reported. 

Vice President JD Vance is also set to meet Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky at the Munich Security Conference this week.

Trump has said he wants an eye-watering $500 million deal with Zelensky to acquire rare-earth minerals and gas in Ukraine in exchange for security guarantees in a potential peace settlement.

Trump and Zelensky have had a notoriously frosty relationship due to the Republican’s friendship with Putin.