Exclusive: How Russia’s Security Service Preys On Young Activists To Turn Them Into Informants?

Why would Russia seek help from North Korea? 1:02 (CNN) – Mikhail Sokolov knows Russian agents could be watching him: He says he spied on his own fellow activists for Moscow for years. He now says that he is seeking asylum in the Netherlands, as he cautiously walks the canals of Amsterdam, telling CNN about his recruitment as an informer, his betrayal of opposition groups he joined, and why did he go out? “If we are to believe their words, they really think that the CIA is trying to facilitate a revolution in Russia and that Navalny is a CIA agent,” Sokolov said of the FSB, the service that replaced the KGB when the Soviet Union fell. “They deploy enormous amounts of resources and efforts so that the revolution does not take place in Russia. They are looking for a foreign enemy.” He says the FSB is also “obsessed” with who might succeed the poisoned and now imprisoned Alexey Navalny as the leader of the country’s opposition movement. Mikhail Sokolov said that the shock of the Russian invasion of Ukraine forced him to turn his back on the FSB. Sokolov’s revelations shed a rare light on the inner workings of the Kremlin’s secretive security service and come in the context of a series of recent defections from Russia since the invasion of Ukraine. CNN has contacted the FSB and CIA for comment on this story. The FSB did not respond and the CIA declined to comment. CNN has not seen any credible evidence or claim that the US government is involved in the Russian opposition movement. From student to spy Sokolov told CNN he was a “normal student, 19 years old,” in 2016 when he first became involved in political activism, joining the Russian Communist Party, essentially a Kremlin-sanctioned opposition group in the Modern Russia, and campaigning against issues like rising public transport fares. But he has also launched his own independent investigations into the corruption of local officials, which may have attracted some official attention. “The Russia of now and the Russia of 2016 are two different countries,” he said. “Then you could be an activist and be safe. I’m not blind, I see what problems my country has, my people. I see how Europe lives. I was motivated to see my country improve.” Russia reacts to G7 meeting seeking to limit Russian oil 1:08 But while he was engaging in activism, he was also dodging his mandatory military service and Sokolov says that’s how the FSB pointed him out. “I was called for a meeting with the head of the Military Enlistment Office, where I was received by an FSB agent. He told me that they had been following me for some time and gave me a choice: agree to cooperate or go to jail for two years. “. Sokolov said he was afraid of jail, where allegations of abuse abound, and decided that accepting the deal was the only way out for him. Keeping an eye on Navalny’s money Within a year, in 2017, Sokolov began volunteering for Navalny’s anti-corruption campaign, he told CNN. In 2021 he was already part of the staff of the organization and shared key information with the FSB. Sometimes the FSB’s interests seemed to align with his own. “At the regional level they are interested in corrupt officials,” Sokolov said. “At the national level they are interested in knowing who finances Navalny’s campaign. They have a theory that we are financed by the CIA.” Sokolov told CNN that he saw no evidence of CIA funding during the time he worked with Navalny’s campaign, and Navalny himself has always steadfastly denied any links to US intelligence. Sokolov, pictured with Alexey Navalny, was not close enough to the opposition leader to have any information about him and was instead told to report the source of the money. As the Kremlin intensified its crackdown on dissidents in his country, Sokolov says he was sent by his FSB superiors to the former Soviet republic of Georgia to infiltrate the growing community of Russian expatriates fleeing the crackdown. Once again, Sokolov says, the FSB seemed very concerned that the CIA was recruiting Russians. “They thought that the Georgian security services were recruiting members of the opposition under the direction of the US CIA,” Sokolov said, though again he saw no evidence this was happening. Sokolov said that he never believed that what the FSB was doing was correct and that his work for them was a “huge burden”. But still he carried out his missions for more than five years. The war changed missions and minds Another young activist told CNN a similar story of coerced recruitment and then demands by the FSB. Vsevolod Osipov was a member of Russia’s fringe Libertarian Party when he was approached, though he told CNN he thought the organization was too small and insignificant to deserve the attention of the security service. But after being arrested in May 2021 in connection with an earlier protest against Navalny’s arrest, Osipov – then just 19 years old – agreed to spy on Russian individuals and groups opposed to President Vladimir Putin’s government in exchange for avoiding jail. Vsevolod Osipov said his handler told him to find out what the Russians thought about the war in Ukraine. “He had various tasks,” he said. “I had to meet specific people, get acquainted with them. For example, the leader of the Libertarian Party of Russia, Yaroslav Conway, or the main coordinator of the Free Russia Foundation in Georgia, Anton Mikhalchuk.” Once again, there was keen interest in what, if any, outside involvement there might be from Western intelligence organizations. “There were other more complex tasks: find out if there is any cooperation with the West or find out what was going on behind the scenes in a certain organization, if the opposition is working for the American special services or for other countries,” he said. Osipov said that he, too, was sent to Georgia, where he was told to monitor the views of the Russian community, especially about the war in Ukraine and how other countries and non-governmental organizations were helping Ukrainian refugees. “As soon as the war started, my superior asked me to find out what the general community thinks about the invasion of Ukraine,” he said. “The FSB was also interested in any cooperation with Western security services or if anyone is receiving funding from abroad.” The fear was always the danger to the Kremlin and Putin, he said. Court finds Alexey Navalny guilty of fraud and sentences him to prison 0:43 “Russian security services know the history of our country very well,” Osipov said. “When a huge migrant community arises abroad, where people talk freely with each other, work on projects together, help Ukrainian refugees, it basically creates a mini-Russia abroad, which is not under the control of the FSB; they have afraid that history will repeat itself like in 1917, when Lenin came to Moscow and started a revolution,” he added. “They are afraid that his regime will be affected now during this war.” He says that he is speaking now to try to right some of his mistakes and perhaps offer some protection to his mother, who is still in Russia. “I really want to go home,” he said. “I don’t hate the country, but our government,” Osipov added. Back in Amsterdam, Mikhail Sokolov said it was the shock of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24 that overcame his fears of repercussions and forced him to turn his back on the FSB. “I hate the way Russia is now. I hate everything about Russia now, the fact that they have started the war against our brother people, my brother people,” he said.