FBI warns Russia is plotting assassinations in US and Europe targeting dissidents

The US Department of Justice has unsealed indictments against five individuals linked to Russian intelligence, including FSB officer Kirill Khrameev and former colonel Yuri Khrameev, for plotting to assassinate a prominent Russian dissident in Washington, DC. The network allegedly offered $40,000 to a Brooklyn resident to carry out the murder. This development marks a significant escalation, violating unwritten Cold War rules against physical attacks on US soil, while also exposing Russian efforts to sabotage European infrastructure.

Washington DC assassination plot

• ▪The United States Department of Justice unsealed indictments charging five individuals with conspiring to conduct attacks and murders globally, including a plot to assassinate a prominent Russian dissident in Washington, DC.
• ▪Members of a Russian intelligence network offered $40,000 to a Brooklyn resident to surveil and murder a Russian dissident in Washington, DC, but the resident rejected the murder offer after conducting the surveillance.
• ▪The FBI disrupted the Washington, DC assassination plot through coordinated work across multiple field offices, components, and partner agencies.

FSB spy network operatives

• ▪The five defendants charged in an indictment unsealed in Manhattan federal court against a Russian intelligence network are currently believed to be residing abroad and remain at large
• ▪The Russian intelligence network recruited Cuban nationals Oemis Romagoza Durruthy and Yaidel Delgado Suarez, and Venezuelan national Angel Eduardo Castro, to facilitate the surveillance and assassination plots.
• ▪The unsealed indictment named Kirill Khrameev, a serving officer of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), and his father, Yuri Khrameev, a former FSB colonel, as key operatives in the spy network.

Kremlin targeting US soil

• ▪Harvard University researcher Calder Walton stated that the United States Department of Justice unsealed an indictment in Manhattan court to expose the network led by Yuri Khrameev, warn potential recruits, reassure dissidents, and use public attribution as a counterintelligence weapon
• ▪The unsealed indictment against Kirill Khrameev represents a departure from an unwritten Cold War agreement between the United States and Russia to avoid conducting physical assassinations on each other's sovereign territory

European infrastructure attacks

• ▪Security expert Philip Ingram stated that Europe can expect an increasing wave of Russian shadow war attacks, including sabotage, cyber attacks, and drone activity, due to a lack of robust Western responses.
• ▪An indictment unsealed in Manhattan federal court states that an FSB-linked Russian intelligence network solicited associates to carry out acts of terrorism against civilian and military infrastructure in European countries aligned with Ukraine

Roman Dobrokhotov target

• ▪Russian dissident journalist Roman Dobrokhotov, the editor-in-chief of The Insider, was previously identified in a London trial as a target of a Russian spy ring that planned to murder him in Britain.
• ▪The Russian government declared Roman Dobrokhotov a wanted man in September 2021, accusing him of illegally crossing the border to leave Russia after his outlet investigated the poisoning of Alexei Navalny.

Debatable claims

• ▪The West should adopt a more aggressive response to Russian shadow war operations
• ▪The US should publicly expose foreign espionage plots rather than keeping them secret