US Charges Five People Linked To Russian ‘Assassination Network’
The FBI has foiled an alleged Russian intelligence linked plot to kill a prominent Russian dissident believed to be living in Washington, DC, US authorities said, exposing a wider network accused of surveillance, targeted killings and attacks against countries seen as supporting Ukraine.
The US Justice Department unsealed an indictment against five people accused of working for Russian intelligence services. All five remain at large. Prosecutors charged them with conspiring to finance terrorism, while three also face charges of conspiring to commit murder for hire.
The alleged organisation, described as the Russian Intelligence Services Network, has operated since at least 2024, according to the indictment. US authorities said it initially focused on Russian dissidents and defectors before expanding after Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine to countries perceived as supporting Kyiv.
The network allegedly recruited people in the US and other countries to conduct surveillance and killings. Its associates were also allegedly asked to carry out attacks against civilian and military infrastructure in European countries aligned with Ukraine.
The alleged Washington plot unfolded this summer. Prosecutors said Yuri Khrameev, a former Russian intelligence colonel, and two others, Yaidel Delgado Suarez and Angel Eduardo Castro, recruited a Venezuelan citizen living in Brooklyn to surveil and kill a prominent Russian dissident.
The target has not been publicly identified and is referred to as “Victim 1” in the indictment.
The Brooklyn resident was sent to two locations linked to the target and given explicit surveillance instructions. He was promised $1,000 and $1,500 for the work and provided photographs and videos of locations associated with the intended victim.
He was later offered $40,000 to “eliminate” or “disappear” the dissident through murder, authorities said. He refused, after which the alleged intelligence network approached other people in the US to complete the killing.
The indictment also alleges a separate assassination plot involving Lithuania, with money offered to carry out another killing. US authorities say the network had conducted or attempted attacks and murders in several countries.
The five defendants are Yuri Khrameev, Kirill Khrameev, Oemis Romagoza Durruthy, Yaidel Delgado Suarez and Angel Eduardo Castro. Kirill Khrameev, Yuri’s son, is identified as an officer with Russia’s Federal Security Service, or FSB. Durruthy is described as a Cuban national and influential member of the Cuban diaspora in Russia.
FBI officials said multiple field offices and partner agencies moved quickly to disrupt the alleged plot. James C Barnacle Jr, head of the FBI’s New York office, said Russian intelligence affiliates had conspired to “intimidate, threaten, or murder” people in the US and around the world.