Russian Digest
Top weekly stories I'm keeping an eye on
Ukrainian sea drones target Russian-occupied gas platforms in Crimea, Navy says
Ukrainian naval drones have destroyed surveillance systems on Russian-held gas platforms in occupied Crimea, the Commander of the Naval Forces Vice-Admiral Oleksii Neizhpapa, announced on Nov. 7.
"The hunt for the enemy in the Black Sea continues. The occupiers will not stay on our territory — we will get them everywhere," he said in a post on Facebook.
"Naval (drones) delivered precise strikes on Russian targets," he said.
Read More at Kyiv Independent
Putin surrenders Syria. Bashar al-Assad informed that Russia will not save him
Russia has informed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad that it does not intend to intervene significantly to save his regime from rapidly advancing rebels who have captured several major cities in the past few weeks.
As Sky News Arabia reports, citing an informed source, Assad was informed that Russia's intervention, if any, would be limited, since Moscow now has "other priorities."
A Bloomberg source close to the Kremlin confirms that Moscow has no plan to save Assad, whose regime nearly collapsed in 2011 and has been held together for the past nine years by the Russian army. Such a plan is unlikely to emerge, the Bloomberg source says, given that Assad's army is retreating and surrendering one city after another.
On Friday, forces led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) advanced to the city of Homs. They captured Aleppo in the north over the weekend before moving south, taking Hama on Thursday. On Friday, it was reported that Kurdish forces had entered Deir Ezzor in Syria and taken control of border crossings with Iraq after Assad's forces abandoned the city to advance into the center of the country.
Now the rebels are approaching Homs, the capture of which will cut off the western, coastal region of the country from the territory controlled by the authorities. This is where the naval base in Tartus, restored in 2015 (Russia calls it a logistics center for the Navy) and the air base in Khmeimim are located. The Russian fleet left Tartus at the beginning of the week, which the Russian Defense Ministry explained by "exercises" in the Mediterranean Sea.
“Assad’s future has never looked more fragile than it does today, and at this point Russia appears unable — or perhaps even unwilling — to save him,” Charles Lister, director of the Syria and counterterrorism and extremism programs at the Washington-based Middle East Institute, told Bloomberg. “ Much of Homs’s countryside still tacitly supports the opposition, and that will go a long way toward clearing a bold path to the city itself.”
The Syrian army denied defeats at the front, saying it was redeploying forces and preparing to launch a counterattack with the support of Russian warplanes. Russian airstrikes followed in the city of Idlib and HTS positions in the provinces of Aleppo and Hama.
On December 1, it became known that Russia had replaced the commander of its group in Syria. After the capture of Aleppo by opposition forces, Lieutenant General Sergei Kisel was removed from his post. Colonel General Alexander Chaiko, who led the unsuccessful attempt to take Kyiv, was appointed in his place, z-bloggers reported.
Via Moscow Times
Russian milbloggers raise alarm over threat to Kremlin bases in Syria amid escalating Middle East crisis
Russian military positions in Syria are under increasing threat as rebel forces make significant advances in the country, Russian milbloggers have warned.
Syrian rebel forces launched a major surprise offensive last week, advancing rapidly through the country, and seizing the major cities of Aleppo and Hama.
According to the latest reports, they are now approaching the capital Damascus. Events are unfolding rapidly, and the Russian milblogger's claims could not be independently verified.
There is much at stake for Russia — if Assad's regime falls, Russia will lose its regional foothold in the Middle East, including its only naval base in the Mediterranean, and its regional and global influence will be diminished.
Read More at Kyiv Independent
Some news:
Madi Kapparov and I just launched a new substack to investigate malign influence operations, corruption, and backroom deals.
Our first investigation of a Russian agent who was arrested in November in NYC.
Germany’s cybersecurity and infrastructure under attack by Russia, chancellor says
Attacks “also come from China from time to time,” Olaf Scholz told lawmakers in parliament.
Cybersecurity and infrastructure in Germany are under “severe threat” by foreign adversaries such as Russia and China, said Chancellor Olaf Scholz in the Bundestag on Wednesday.
“As we all know, the main causes of attacks of this kind that affect our cybersecurity come from Russia,” Scholz said in the Bundestag. “And of course, they also come from China from time to time. And that should not be concealed.”
The United States said Tuesday night a major Chinese hack of global telecom providers is "ongoing." There has also been disruption following damage to two undersea fiber-optic cables in the Baltic Sea which sparked suspicions of sabotage.
Read More via Politico
Romanian court annuls presidential vote after Russian interference claims
Calin Georgescu won the first round of the election after being propelled by TikTok. Romania’s security services pointed to “Russian hybrid actions.”
The Constitutional Court took the extraordinary step of annulling Romania’s presidential election Friday after the country’s security services assessed that the nation had been the target of “Russian hybrid actions” that used TikTok to promote a candidate who has praised Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The ruling rippled across Europe, where the continent’s leaders have been closely watching the highly charged race to determine the future of a strategically important NATO member.
“We all have to be aware that Russia is trying to interfere with our elections,” said Siegfried Muresan, a member of the European Parliament from the center-right National Liberal Party. “Their interference has accelerated over recent months, and Romania’s election was a test for the resilience of the whole European Union.”
Read More via The Washington Post
Police in Georgia turn increasingly brutal as mass protests over ending EU talks enter second week
Mass protests in Georgia fueled by the governing party’s decision to suspend negotiations on joining the European Union entered a second week on Thursday, with police cracking down on the protesters with increasing force in an attempt to curb the demonstrations.
On Wednesday, an opposition leader was dragged into a police car and arrested, his party said. Several other activists have been arrested and scores of demonstrators and some journalists have been brutally beaten.
Georgian journalist Guram Rogava was doing a live broadcast from a protest when a riot policeman rushed up to him and hit him in the head on Friday. Rogava suffered fractured facial bones in the assault.
After being discharged from the hospital Monday with an immobilized neck and a bandaged head, he said he was lucky to be able to move his hands and talk.
“It was clear that they were deliberately attacking media representatives,” he told The Associated Press. “The government is in such a state that, for some reason, its survival instinct dictates the need to intimidate the media.”
Read More via AP
The GRU vandals: Moscow’s hired thugs are causing mayhem in Estonia
Russian military intelligence (GRU) enlisted an Estonian pro-Russian propagandist to orchestrate a series of vandalism acts designed to intimidate and silence critics of Russia within Estonia. The targets of these attacks included the country's interior minister.
On the morning of December 8, 2023, Estonian Interior Minister Lauri Läänemets awoke to an unpleasant surprise. His wife informed him that overnight the family car, a gray Volkswagen Passat parked near his private home in Tallinn, had been vandalized, all of its windows shattered. “I immediately suspected this wasn’t random vandalism,” Läänemets said. “The windows had been broken systematically, yet nothing was stolen. But I couldn’t guess what exactly it was about at that moment.” In fact, Läänemets and his family were being surveilled by hirelings of a foreign intelligence service.
Only hours earlier, Allan Hantsom, a pro-Russian activist in Estonia, had been preparing to flee the country. His belongings were packed and the moving trucks were ready and waiting. Hantsom knew it was his last day at home; his apartment had already been listed for sale for some time. Then he heard something. It certainly wasn’t a knock. Was it the sound of a door being forced open?
Read More via The Insider
UK uncovers vast crypto laundering scheme for gangsters and Russian spies
Multibillion-dollar ring across London, Moscow and Dubai connected cash-rich criminals with sanctions evaders
A UK-led operation has uncovered a multibillion-dollar money laundering scheme run out of London, Moscow and Dubai that enabled Russian spies and European drug traffickers to evade sanctions using cryptocurrency. The UK’s National Crime Agency said on Wednesday that its “Operation Destabilise” investigation centred on two companies — Smart and TGR — that acted as a financial hub for cash-rich global criminals and sanctioned individuals relying on cryptocurrency outside the banking system. The NCA said the network had been used by clients including the Kinahan cartel, Irish cocaine traffickers linked to numerous contract killings, as well as funding ransomware groups, and “Russian espionage operations” from late 2022 to summer 2023.
The illicit network, operating across more than 30 countries, illustrates the growing interaction between hostile states and organised criminals as economic sanctions have forced countries such as Russia to find new ways of operating in the west. The case also shows the increasing use of cryptocurrencies by those cut off from the global banking system.
Read More via FT
Hungarian CIA reportedly spied on EU officials
Officials from EU anti-fraud office were allegedly followed, wiretapped and had their laptops hacked by Hungary’s intelligence agency.
Hungary’s intelligence agency spied on EU officials visiting the country, searching their hotel rooms and recording their phone conversations, according to a bombshell report.
A joint investigation by Direkt36 and De Tijd found Hungary’s Information Office (IH), Budapest’s equivalent of the CIA, targeted investigators at the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), which at one point was looking into a Hungarian company owned by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s son-in-law.
The report by Hungarian investigative media center Direkt36 and Belgian newspaper De Tijd cited examples between 2015 and 2017 in which EU officials working for OLAF who had traveled to Hungary were physically followed during car journeys and had their phones tapped.
Read More via Politico