The soldier finally agreed to assist Russia, in keeping with the Safety Service of Ukraine, or SBU. Performing on directions from his Russian handler, the SBU mentioned in a press launch, the soldier deliberate so as to add a toxic substance to the water provide of the laundry complicated utilized by senior officers.
The company mentioned it had thwarted the soldier’s plot to poison the Ukrainian navy command within the southeastern Zaporizhzhia area after the Russians had threatened his household. He has been charged with treason and faces life imprisonment.
The incident sheds mild on a tactic Russia’s safety providers are utilizing to recruit Ukrainians.
Moscow’s preliminary plan was to have its brokers infiltrate the best ranges of Ukrainian society forward of its invasion after which seize energy from inside. However most of these individuals have been both weeded out by Ukrainian regulation enforcement or fled on their very own within the first months after Russia’s invasion.
Now, greater than two years into the conflict, there are fewer Ukrainians with pro-Russian sympathies, particularly in positions of affect, prepared to assist Moscow.
Movies, paperwork and textual content message exchanges supplied to The Washington Put up by SBU officers and Ukrainians contacted by people claiming to signify Russia’s particular providers revealed that in lots of circumstances the Russians used extortion to pressure Ukrainians to work for them — by threatening relations who nonetheless dwell beneath Russian occupation or who’ve been taken prisoner.
The Put up shouldn’t be absolutely figuring out the SBU officers or the opposite people as a result of publishing their names might put them at risk, and would additionally threat the protection of relations in Russian captivity or dwelling beneath Russian occupation.
Whereas some Ukrainians have entry to high officers and worthwhile data, such because the soldier in Zaporizhzhia, many are simply on a regular basis individuals with no coaching or expertise in espionage. Directions from the Russian handlers have included reporting on the motion of navy gear or confirming {that a} missile struck its goal.
In a conflict during which the battle traces have moved little previously 12 months, any kernel of data can present an edge.
The Ukrainian soldier — the SBU has not disclosed his identification — communicated with somebody from the Russian Federal Safety Service, or FSB, by means of the Telegram encrypted messaging app. In textual content messages that the SBU has made public, the FSB agent requested the soldier to supply data on his navy unit — what its duties have been, who was a part of the command construction and photographs of their positions.
“We don’t ask the type of data we don’t should know,” the soldier replied in a single message. “It may well trigger suspicion.”
“You don’t should ask something,” the FSB handler replied. “Take photographs of the materiel your unit has.”
Extortion isn’t a brand new technique utilized by Russian safety providers, but it surely has change into extra widespread as Russia has occupied roughly 20 % of Ukraine and brought hundreds of prisoners. SBU officers mentioned the Russians will ship photographs and movies to relations of prisoners of conflict, generally displaying the prisoner with a gun to their head.
One sufferer of such threats was Yana, whose mom was a Ukrainian border guard within the northeast Kharkiv area when Russia invaded. The mom was instantly taken prisoner, however months later, Yana obtained unusual messages from her mom’s cellphone. At first, the particular person on the opposite finish was well mannered, Yana mentioned, promising that her mom wouldn’t be harmed. However in alternate they needed data, and requested if Yana noticed any navy gear in her Kharkiv neighborhood.
The tone modified after Yana refused to reply.
“The Russians are indignant,” one message mentioned. “There’s one lady, many males,” one other mentioned.
Yana then obtained a name from her mom. She informed Yana that she wanted to reply to the messages.
“She mentioned her life relied on it,” Yana mentioned.
Yana’s mom was finally launched and not lives beneath Russian occupation after Ukraine recaptured many of the Kharkiv area in September 2022.
In different circumstances, nevertheless, the Russians took Ukrainian prisoners with them as they retreated. One was an aged man. Months after he was taken captive, his son obtained a Telegram message from an unknown quantity with an image of the previous man. The sender deleted the message seconds later. The Put up shouldn’t be figuring out the son as a result of his father stays a Russian prisoner.
“He regarded so skinny, like he’d been in a focus camp,” he mentioned. “The subsequent message was, ‘If you need your father to dwell, you’ll work for us.’”
The son stalled, asking for extra time to suppose. However the SBU caught wind of what the Russians have been making an attempt and contacted the person earlier than he might move any data, a counterintelligence official mentioned. Now, the SBU displays the son’s communications with the Russians and directs his replies so it looks like he’s cooperating.
Had the SBU not intervened, the son mentioned, he would have finished what the Russians requested. He lives in worry now, nervous that he’s being watched and that the Russians will discover out that he spoke to Ukrainian regulation enforcement.
“It was all a shock,” he mentioned. “I didn’t know what to inform them in order that they wouldn’t harm him.”
Even when they’re reacting to brutal extortion, Ukrainians who comply with spy for Russia face harsh jail time.
An SBU counterintelligence officer who has investigated such circumstances mentioned he “feels sorry” for individuals whose relations are threatened, however mentioned they need to contact the authorities as quickly as Russian particular providers make contact, “to make it unattainable or reduce the harm from the barbaric actions” of the Russians.
In that case, they are going to be handled as victims, not traitors. “If an individual doesn’t act on this method, she or he ought to perceive that his actions are topic to prison legal responsibility,” the officer mentioned.
Regardless of Russia’s assaults on peaceable Ukrainian cities, some Ukrainians don’t have to be pressured to betray their nation. Dmytro Logvinov, 60, had lengthy been a “Russophile,” his father mentioned, regardless of having been born and dwelling in Kharkiv. In 2009, he even turned a Russian citizen.
When the invasion began, Logvinov contacted a cousin, a former Russian navy officer in Belgorod, simply throughout the border, and supplied to assist the invaders. The cousin finally related him to “Maksim,” who turned Dmytro’s FSB handler. At one level, Dmytro despatched Maksim a selfie video speaking in regards to the fantastic climate in Kharkiv as a constructing burned within the background from a missile strike — affirmation for the Russians that their goal had been hit.
One other time, Dmytro, who labored as a safety guard, mentioned foreigners have been dwelling in a Kharkiv resort, making the location a goal.
Dmytro was arrested by the SBU shortly after that. Exterior a courthouse in Kharkiv the place Dmytro was on trial for treason, his father, Eduard Logvinov, dialed a quantity for Maksim, the handler. He didn’t choose up.
An SBU counterintelligence official had supplied the quantity. “Maksim’s” actual title was Andrei Salitsev, in keeping with the SBU, which additionally supplied The Put up a duplicate of the faux passport with a unique surname that the SBU mentioned he used. The FSB didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Salitsev had assured Dmytro that Russia would shield him even when he was caught, Eduard Logvinov mentioned. However after Dmytro’s arrest, the handler stopped answering.
The SBU officer gave Eduard a quantity for Salitsev’s mom and inspired him to name. Perhaps she might move a message to her son, the officer mentioned. She picked up.
“His solely method out now’s if Russia tries to do a prisoner alternate for him,” Eduard informed the lady. “He was engaged on behalf of Russia, and he was involved together with your son as his agent. Are you able to inform your son to assist transfer this course of alongside from the Russian facet?”
“What’s Andrei’s final title?” Eduard requested the lady.
“I received’t inform you that,” she answered. “He will get indignant with me — he says I shouldn’t inform that to individuals.”
“Is it Salitsev?” Eduard requested.
“Effectively, sure,” she mentioned.
He’s in “a unique nation,” she mentioned, including she has barely had contact with him for the previous six months.
Lower than per week after the decision, Dmytro was sentenced to fifteen years for treason.
“After these persons are arrested, they principally overlook about them,” mentioned the SBU officer, who spoke on the situation of anonymity in line with safety service protocols. “The Russians simply transfer on to in search of another person.”
