Heads of Russian FSB Foreign Intelligence Department under house arrest due to failed Ukraine invasion
Photo: Sergey Beseda, head of the 5th Service (Service of Operational Information and International Relations) of the Russian Federal Security Service.
The heads of the 5th service of the FSB (Federal Security Service), which is responsible for foreign intelligence and specializes in Ukraine, have been put under house arrest, reported Meduza, citing journalist Andrei Soldatov.
Soldatov reported, citing his sources, that these are the head of the department Sergey Beseda and his deputy Anatoly Bolyukh.
Among the reasons for the arrest are the embezzlement of funds allocated for subversive and agent work in Ukraine, as well as providing deliberately false information about the political situation in Ukraine.
There has been no information from Russian government sources about the arrest.
The FSB Service of Operational Information and International Relations (5th Service) is the third intelligence service in Russia after GRU (the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces) and SVR (the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation).
According to Andrei Soldatov's article published on the Agentura.ru website, the 5th service "promotes the Kremlin's agenda, using all available means, in the post-Soviet countries" and "not only in them."
Sergey Beseda has been under U.S. and European Union sanctions since 2014 for his alleged role in destabilizing the situation in Ukraine and violating its sovereignty.