Paul Goble
Staunton, August 27 – A major investigation by the Meduza news agency concludes that the FSB prepares lists of individuals and organizations whom it believes could be charged with being “foreign agents” and thus whose activities could be restricted or ended and then the Russian Security Council with Vladimir Putin’s participation makes the final choice.
As the number of individuals and media outlets charged with being “foreign agents” has skyrocketed, protests against this by journalists increased, and the Kremlin having defended the government’s application of the term, it has become critically important to track the exact process under which this is happening.
Meduza investigative journalist Liliya Yapparova spoke with numerous experts with knowledge of one or another part of this process, most importantly Andrey Soldatov and Konstantin Gaaze before writing up her detailed, 6,000-word report (meduza.io/feature/2021/08/27/vy-vragi-otechestva-i-vas-nuzhno-veshat-na-stolbah).
She concludes that the FSB’s second service, which is concerned with “the defense of the constitutional order and the struggle with terrorism,” prepares lists of those who might be charged, working with people in the Procurator General’s office and the Justice Ministry, and then forwards these lists to the Russian Security Council.
That pattern is what many have suspected, but Yapparova provides so much evidence that this is exactly how the process works that no one is likely to believe any alternative explanations in the future.
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