The offer was blunt: $25,000 to track and kill a person in the Lithuanian capital who, according to U.S. prosecutors, was “telling lies about Russia”. The alleged approach came last year from Yuri Khrameev, a former military officer in the Russian intelligence services, who prosecutors say sought to recruit a U.S. citizen for the operation.
The allegation is at the centre of a new U.S. case that offers an unusually detailed account of what prosecutors describe as a Russian intelligence network operating across borders to organise attacks and killings in Europe and the United States. The U.S. Justice Department unsealed charges late Tuesday against five people allegedly working for Russia’s intelligence services. All five defendants remain at large, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office in the Southern District of New York.
The indictment describes Khrameev, known as Colonel Yuri, as someone who allegedly attempted to recruit people to kill Russian dissidents. But the alleged plans extended beyond individuals. In messages cited by prosecutors, Khrameev expressed an interest in infrastructure in NATO countries, including train stations, bus depots and warehouses holding aid for Ukraine.
When the American he had approached refused to carry out the proposed killing, prosecutors say Khrameev responded with instructions for other forms of disruption. “I am interested in all the countries that are helping Ukraine,” he wrote, before suggesting attacks involving petrol, electrical substations and warehouses containing property or food. He also told the recruit: “You’re looking for such objects yourself. You need to approach it creatively.”
The allegations have placed the case within a wider pattern of incidents that U.S. prosecutors describe as part of an expanding Russian campaign of so-called hybrid attacks against European countries supporting Ukraine with weapons and money. The charges suggest that the alleged activity was not confined to conventional intelligence gathering, but included attempts to recruit people in other countries to carry out acts of violence and sabotage for payment.
“These defendants allegedly operated as part of a global assassination network that reached into the United States, attempting to recruit U.S. citizens and foreigners to carry out killings at the behest of the Kremlin,” said John Eisenberg, the assistant U.S. attorney general for national security. “Actions like these represent a gross violation of our sovereignty and a threat to our national security.”
The U.S. allegations echo a series of cases reported across Europe this summer. In Germany, authorities officially attributed the recent discovery of an explosive-laden drone at Leipzig-Halle airport to Russia earlier this month. Poland said in August that it had thwarted an attempted assassination of a U.S. citizen originally from Ukraine that had been ordered by Russia.
Estonia also accused Moscow last month of responsibility for a fire at a defence firm. In the United Kingdom, two Ukrainian nationals were convicted of conspiring to carry out arson attacks against a car and property linked to former British Prime Minister Keir Starmer. One of them had allegedly been recruited online by a Russian-speaking Telegram user.
The new indictment also describes an alleged effort to extend such operations directly into the United States. This summer, Russian spies allegedly recruited a Venezuelan citizen living in Brooklyn, New York, to surveil and kill a prominent Russian dissident believed to be living in Washington. According to prosecutors, two people involved in the alleged operation, including one known as “Viking” and described as a Cuban national living in Russia, told the recruit that they wanted the dissident to “disappear” in return for $40,000. The recruit refused.
Taken together, the allegations presented by the Justice Department depict an alleged campaign in which foreign nationals and residents could be approached to perform tasks ranging from surveillance and assassination to attacks on infrastructure. The cases also illustrate the geographical reach prosecutors attribute to the network, extending from European countries supporting Ukraine to targets and potential recruits inside the United States.
The charges, however, arrive at a politically sensitive moment for Washington. U.S. President Donald Trump has adopted a conciliatory approach towards Russian President Vladimir Putin as he seeks to reignite peace talks between Russia and Ukraine. The administration has not so far commented on whether it will take action against Russia if the allegations are proved.
The case also comes amid renewed attention to previous allegations of Russian intelligence activity abroad. Earlier cases, including the assassination attempt against former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter using a nerve agent in the U.K., triggered U.S. sanctions.
Meanwhile, ProPublica reported earlier this week that a Russian oligarch personally sanctioned by Ukraine over his ties to Putin, and who accompanied the Russian president on a recent state visit to China, paid for a post-wedding celebration for Donald Trump Jr. earlier this year.
For Washington, the latest allegations therefore present a complicated intersection of national security, relations with Moscow and the effort to revive negotiations over Ukraine. At the centre of the U.S. indictment, however, is a more direct allegation: that Russian intelligence-linked actors sought to turn individuals in foreign countries into operatives for killings and attacks, including on American soil. Whether the charges ultimately produce prosecutions or further measures against Russia remains to be seen, but the allegations have brought the alleged reach of Moscow’s covert activities into sharp focus.
