And in the contest to be the next Russian official tossed out a fifth story window... Top Russian Official Slams ‘Significant’ War Flops to Putin’s Face SCHOOLED Russia’s Prosecutor General Igor Krasnov informed Vladimir Putin that, among other problems, more than 9,000 reservists were illegally mobilized in the war against Ukraine. https://www.thedailybeast.com/top-r...oblems-in-ukraine-war-to-putins-face?ref=home
Russian Assassinations a Growing Worry as War Nears Second Year: Sources U.S. and Ukrainian intelligence sources say Putin could call for more assassinations and asymmetric attacks on the West as war drags on. https://www.vice.com/en/article/v7vwa9/russia-assassinations-putin-ukraine-war Since the outset of the war in Ukraine last February, a growing list of mysterious deaths of Vladimir Putin’s critics and Kremlin-linked foreign operations have come to light. And as the battlefield losses mount for Russian forces, there’s no question Putin is increasingly leaning on his security and intelligence services to support the war effort. The Russian government and its foreign assassins have been linked to a brazen string of global killings in recent years, especially in Europe. U.S. and Ukrainian government sources say the Kremlin is out to settle scores, especially with dissidents and defectors. Those same sources agreed Russia could someday target some of the many foreign fighters who joined the Ukrainian war effort as reprisals when they return home. There’s already been several stories of suspected Russian intelligence agents recently deployed abroad: An “epidemic” of suspicious oligarch deaths across the world; a letter bombing campaign against politicians in Spain thought to be backed by Russian agents; a foiled attempted-murder of a dissident Kremlin critic in France last fall; Russian military spies (GRU) in Poland active on the Ukrainian border posing as a tourist company; Bulgaria and Czechia both expelling Kremlin diplomats over the alleged bombing of ammo dumps inside their countries; and a flipped German double agent working for the Kremlin, among other incidents of Moscow-directed espionage activities. One U.S. intelligence source familiar with Russia’s spy capabilities—who was not authorized to speak to the media—said the “reach” of their operations is vast and global. The source also noted that Russian-aligned entities with the capacity to undertake lethal operations are thought to be present on U.S. soil. The same source did temper those fears, saying a stateside Kremlin-sanctioned hit on a dissident or an American would be an escalatory and bold move. According to them, while Russia’s foreign intelligence arm (the SVR) likely doesn’t “have the bandwidth right now” for planning an “elaborate and complicated covert action” in the U.S. (something VICE News also heard from an expert on Russian intelligence), past plots in the U.K. and Germany shows they do have the appetite for operations in Europe writ-large. “The Skripals, the Litvinenkos” they said, referring to past assassination plots in England targeting two ex-spies unfriendly to Putin (not to mention a spy-thriller level kill in Berlin of a Chechen defector in 2019) as evidence the Russian memory of its enemies is long and its willingness to send assassins to unfriendly territory is unquestionable. (Much more at above url)
At this point, it is becoming a question if Putin is killing them or are rival fractions killing them. A Russian general was poisoned by a letter laced with an unknown toxin, close Putin ally says https://news.yahoo.com/russian-general-poisoned-letter-laced-115952476.html?fr=sycsrp_catchall Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said his top general in Ukraine has been poisoned. Apti Alaudinov was poisoned after handling a letter sent to him earlier this month, Kadyrov said. Alaudinov sought immediate medical assistance and is "on the mend," Kadyrov said. A Russian general was poisoned by a letter laced with an unknown toxin, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said in a Telegram post on Monday. Kadyrov, who is also a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, said his top general in Ukraine has been poisoned after handling a letter that was sent to him on February 8. Apti Alaudinov, who commands the Akhmat special forces, picked up a letter that was "saturated with a poisonous substance," Kadyrov said. The general "sensed this by the bitter, specific smell and took action in time: he treated his hands and washed his nasal cavity," Kadyrov added. The Chechen leader said that Alaudinov and other personnel who came into contact with the envelope sought immediate medical assistance in a Moscow clinic and are now "on the mend." "Serious consequences were avoided," Kadyrov added. It is unclear who sent the letter or what exactly the substance was, but Kadyrov said an investigation was underway and that there are " already results." The Akhmat special forces is a Chechen paramilitary organization, which has been fighting in Ukraine. Before the war, Alaudinov led Chechnya's police force, which had been accused of torturing and imprisoning members of the LGBTQ+ community, ABC News reported. As a result, he was placed on a US sanctions list. This is not the first poison-related incident since the start of Russia's invasion on February 24 last year. In March last year, Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich briefly went blind after an apparent poisoning during peace meetings with Ukrainian negotiators. Read the original article on Business Insider
New day, new dead oligarch. Russian energy tycoon and major oil oligarch dies mysteriously aged 59 The energy tycoon was the husband of the daughter of the ex-president of the Russian Federation Boris Yeltsin. https://www.express.co.uk/news/worl...il-oligarch-Vyacheslav-Rovneiko-Boris-Yeltsin
From the earliest days, I have kept warning these guys to stay away from the guacamole dip. With electricity being spotty, refrigeration is unreliable, and the guacamole dip goes bad very fast. But they don't listen.