Oleh, 19, was offered $1,000 for a paint attack on a police station – but the bag he was given contained a crude bomb

Oleh found the job via a Telegram channel offering day work and side gigs. It sounded easy enough: he was to travel from his home in eastern Ukraine to the western city of Rivne, pick up a rucksack containing a paint canister and spray it outside the local police station.

It would require nimble feet to flee the scene without being caught, but the money on offer – $1,000 – was good, fantastic even, for what amounted to a morning’s work for the 19-year-old.