Putin's top communications officer flees Russia
Captain of the Russian Federal Security Service Gleb Karakulov, who worked until mid-October 2022 as an engineer in the department responsible for the Kremlin’s secure communication channels, fled abroad and condemned the war against Ukraine, reports the Center “Dossier”.
In October 2022, during Putin's official visit to Kazakhstan, Karakulov, who was in Astana as part of a group of FSO employees ensuring Putin’s security, decided to fly with his family to Turkey. To do this, the man used his official passport and the day before returning to Moscow escaped from the hotel and, together with his wife and daughter, boarded a plane to Istanbul.
The officer calls the full-scale war unleashed by Russia against Ukraine as the main reason for his departure. He says he believes Putin is a war criminal and he did not see it possible for him to be in the military service anymore.
"I was supposed to retire in less than two years. And I planned that I would finish the service, pay off the mortgage and that's it. I was not going to extend the contract for sure. But in February, the criminal war began, and I could not make a deal with my conscience. I just couldn't be in the service of this president. Although I did not participate in military operations, but I do not consider it possible for me to carry out his criminal orders or simply be in his service, " he said.
Karakulov also said that Putin has changed because of the isolation.
"One could see two different people between Putin in 2009 and now. We remember when the former director of the FSB became prime minister, the president, was energetic and active. Of course, until 2020 he was just as active, judging by the business trips, there were really a lot of them. And now everything is closed. He has shielded himself from the world with all sorts of barriers, the same quarantine, lack of information. His perception of reality is distorted, " the officer says.
Karakulov, as the Dossier notes, is the highest-ranking Russian intelligence official who, since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, has fled the country and denounced the war. Russian authorities have opened a criminal case accusing him of desertion.