Kyiv court heard 34-year-old GUR officer Vladyslav Reut retract his earlier confession to murdering Anastasiia Berezovska, saying ex-SBU officer Vitalii Zhykovych shot her instead.
Reut said he confessed only after Zhykovych threatened his relatives, claiming Zhykovych loaded a modified Makarov pistol, ordered him to shoot, then fired four shots himself near Yuriv west of Kyiv.
Prosecutors said phone records and cash and cryptocurrency transfers linked both men to Berezovska after she entered Ukraine from Poland two days after the Monaco blast.
Zhykovych's lawyer rejected Reut's new account, but the judge denied bail to both suspects and remanded them on joint premeditated murder charges.
The case has become politically sensitive because both defendants have Ukrainian security backgrounds, while the motive in the failed attack on sanctioned businessman Vadim Yermolayev remains unclear.