The Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation conducted “cleansing” operations among employees who dealt with the “Ukrainian issue” before the Russian invasion, said investigative journalist on the Bellingcat portal Christo Grosev.
Grosev, in an interview with the Russian opposition Popularna Polityka channel, confirmed the information that the former head of the Fifth FSB (foreign intelligence) Sergei Besiada was transferred to the remand facility. His phone was silent for two weeks.
In addition to the feast, “disinfection” Other employees of the FSB Operational Information and International Relations Service who participated in activities in Ukraine were covered. There are 150 officers.
I can say that Many of them, if not arrested, certainly do not work for the FSB. The purge is definitely behind us. I hope that in a few days we can publish something more concrete about the fate of these people Grossi said.
The department deals with the FSB’s relations with foreign partners (eg US agencies), but it also has a department that acts as foreign intelligence for the FSB. His goal was, inter alia, to keep the post-Soviet states in the Russian sphere of influence. In the past, Vladimir Putin headed the same department.
In early March, journalist Andrei Soldatov, who deals with the Russian special services, reported that the head of the FSB department, Sergei Besiada and Anatoly Polyush, had been detained for embezzling funds intended for subversive activities in Ukraine and providing Vladimir Putin with false information about the situation in that country. In recent days, Bessia, in turn, was to be sent to a reserve prison in Leforteau from house arrest.
According to media reports, a feast was held on the eve of the Russian invasion of Ukraine It is to provide Putin with information about the political situation there. However, he was not telling him the truth, but only what the chief wanted to hear. When Putin realized this two weeks after the war, he decided to punish the colonel.
Biesiada has been active in Ukraine for a long time. In February 2014, during Maidan, he was in Kyiv. The FSB argued that it was checking the security of the Russian embassy there – a version that no one believed. According to Soldatov, the feast was there to help Viktor Yanukovych stay in power.
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