FBI: Russia is planning targeted killings in the US and Europe

Russian intelligence services are reportedly planning to carry out targeted assassinations in the United States and European countries that support Ukraine. This was stated by US federal authorities, who announced that they had foiled a plot to kill a well-known Russian dissident believed to be living in Washington. According to an indictment made public at the federal court in Manhattan, five people believed to be living abroad have been charged.

The document states that, from 2024, a network linked to the Russian intelligence services allegedly paid, or attempted to pay, individuals in the United States and other countries to monitor and then kill Russian dissidents. According to the indictment, those recruited by the network were also allegedly asked to carry out acts of terrorism against civilian and military infrastructure in European countries considered aligned with Ukraine. James C. Barnacle Jr., head of the FBI’s New York office, stated that the agency had foiled the plans ‘through relentless work’, whilst members of the intelligence services and their affiliates “conspired to intimidate, threaten or kill people on US soil and around the world”.

According to the statement, a network of individuals working for the Russian Federation’s intelligence services had been conspiring, since at least 2024, to carry out – and had in fact carried out – attacks and murders around the world, including in the United States. Previously, the network had focused on Russian dissidents and defectors, but following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, it had also targeted countries considered to be allies of Ukraine. Recently, members of the network are alleged to have attempted to recruit several people in the United States.

According to the authorities, those charged include three high-ranking members of the Russian intelligence services. They are Yuri Khrameev, a former colonel in the services, his son Kirill Khrameev, an agent of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), and Oemis Romagoza Durruthy, a Cuban national and influential member of the Cuban diaspora living in Russia. According to the indictment, Yuri Khrameev and two other accused individuals, Yaidel Delgado Suarez and Angel Eduardo Castro, both resident in Russia, are alleged to have recruited a Venezuelan national living in Brooklyn to monitor and kill a well-known Russian dissident whom they believed to be living in Washington.

The Brooklyn resident was reportedly sent to two locations associated with the intended victim and received “explicit instructions on how to carry out the surveillance”, with the promise of 1,000 and 1,500 dollars to complete the task. After carrying out the surveillance and providing numerous photographs and videos of locations associated with the intended victim, the US resident refused the $40,000 he had been offered to ‘eliminate’ or ‘make the victim disappear’. Following the rejection of the offer, the intelligence service member who had made the proposal is said to have subsequently offered substantial sums of money to several other people in the United States to carry out the task.