Interpol has named and released images of a woman suspected of planting a bomb in Monaco in an alleged attack targeting a Ukrainian business magnate.
The international policing agency identified the suspect as Anastasiia Berezovska, 39, from Ukraine, in a Red Notice published on its website requesting her arrest.
Two photographs of Berezovska were made public on Friday, alongside details noting that she has a tattoo, possibly depicting a snake, running along her right arm from shoulder to elbow. The notice says she was born in Ukraine, has dark hair and speaks German.
According to Interpol, Monaco authorities are seeking her arrest on suspicion of attempted murder and additional offences.
Police forces across Europe were today searching for the woman, who has been described as “armed and dangerous.”
Berezovska was reportedly last seen fleeing the Mediterranean principality on Monday while wearing a bucket hat as a disguise, after 58-year-old oligarch Vadim Ermolaev, his mistress Anna Nasobina, 46, and their young son were seriously injured.
Interpol issued the Red Notice on Thursday, alongside an arrest warrant connected to the case.
Monaco’s Prosecutor General, Stéphane Thibault, confirmed that the suspect is currently registered as living in Germany.
A senior investigating source suggested the woman had ‘attempted to look like a man’ during the attack, but a witness identified her.
Interpol on Friday named and pictured the bucket hat-wearing suspect in the Monaco bombing
Interpol identified Anastasiia Berezovska, a 39-year-old woman from Ukraine , as the suspect
The suspect captured fleeing the scene on CCTV
Ukrainian oligarch Vadim Ermolaev, 58, was reportedly with his London-based lover when he was wounded
Anna Nasobina is in a ‘serious condition’ fighting for her life after being wounded in an explosion in Monaco on Monday
He said she was likely to be on the run with accomplices in Italy, but might have made her way as far as the Balkans.
Berezovska was filmed outside the ‘Sun’s Palace’ – a lavish apartment block owned by Ermolaev.
It was in the foyer, just before 9pm, that a dumped rucksack exploded after the woman triggered it using a mobile phone.
Nasobina had her legs amputated following the blast, while both her and Ermolaev suffered severe shrapnel wounds and burns.
‘The prime suspect was identified by a witness,’ said the investigating source.
Footage from nearby surveillance cameras showed her wearing a black bucket hat and fleeing on foot across the border to France, where there are no checkpoints.
She headed into the town of Beausoleil, and then made her way to Italy, investigators believe.
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‘She is armed and dangerous, and thought to be in the company of accomplices,’ said the source. ‘She should be approached with extreme caution.’
Judicial authorities in both France and Monaco have opened a criminal enquiry for ‘attempted murder’, ‘the planting of an explosive device on a public road with criminal intent’ and ‘criminal conspiracy.’
Cameras first picked up the suspect in the area on Monday morning, before she returned to place the bomb, according to the same security sources.
She is thought to have been ‘around 12 meters away’ when she triggered the device, said one.
The wounded boy, thought to be aged 13, has made a rapid recovery and is currently providing evidence to police and prosecutors.
‘He is telling them exactly what he saw, although clearly his memory is very blurred,’ said a security source.
‘It appears that his mother took the full force of the blast, while he suffered relatively minor burns and shrapnel injuries.’
Nasobina has been described in the past as Ermolaev’s common-law wife.
She is a Ukrainian national who comes from Ermolaev’s home city of Dnipro, having spent a lot of time in England.
Nasobina is listed as a director of Wycombe Square Investments LLP in London, but was frequently in Monaco, particularly during the summer.
In turn, Ermolaev’s wife, Anna Ermolaev, uses a high-security family villa in St-Jean-Cap-Ferrat, the nearby French Riviera resort town, which is the second most expensive residential location in the world, after Monaco.
The suspect was likely using a so-called burner phone – one that can be bought relatively cheaply, without providing any kind of identification.
Such phones are frequently used by lawbreakers, and then disposed of once a crime has been committed.
Police and French Army helicopters with searchlights and numerous drones have all been seen in the search zone over the days and nights since the attack.
The entrance of the residential building in Monaco where an explosion happened on Monday
Shards of glass on a damaged window of a residential building, following the explosion on Monday
While there are theories that Ukraine’s SBU security service may have been behind the bombing, ‘a settling of scores’ by gangsters is currently the favoured line of investigation.
The blast signalled the first attack of its kind ever to take place on the so-called Rock tax haven, which is less than two miles square and considered neutral territory.
Ermolaev had made multiple enemies over the years, and one of the reasons he moved to Monaco was because of the security it was meant to provide.
Seyar Kurshutov, a Ukrainian businessman from Crimea, who now spends a lot of time in Monaco said his friend was ‘obsessed with security’.
Kurshutov told Le Monde: ‘Vadim was living on a razor’s edge.’
Some of Ermolaev’s most powerful enemies were made through a racket involving fake call centres.
In late 2025, Artur Ermolaev, 35- Vadim Ermolaev’s eldest son – was arrested in Cyprus for his role in the estimated £100m scheme.
Extradited to Estonia, where approximately 500 clients lost around £5million each, he was sentenced to five years in prison, with four months to be served behind bars.
‘He now lives in Israel,’ said Seyar Kurshutov.
Igor Komarov – a 28-year-old businessman involved in the call centres racket – was kidnapped, tortured, killed, and dismembered while on holiday in Bali, Indonesia, in March 2026.
Another security source said: ‘The killers have never been found. This gives an idea of the kind of enemies Ermolaev is up against.’
