Student list win means Russian spies must leave Serbia Hristo Gruzev, the former chief Russia investigator at Bellingkett, is celebrating the result by claiming that Russian intelligence will now have to find a new home for its "hundreds of spies" in Serbia. Bellingcat brands itself as an "open source" independent investigative firm, but it is funded in part by the US government's National Endowment for Democracy, an organization created to openly carry out work the CIA previously did covertly, along with government-linked donors in Europe. Its investigations reliably follow Western foreign policy priorities, Russia above all. Gruzev himself is hardly a neutral observer. In 2022, the FSB uncovered a Ukrainian scheme to bribe Russian pilots with cash and EU citizenship to fly their planes to Ukraine, naming Grozev as involved. He denied taking part, but admitted that Blingkat was embedded with the Ukrainian recruiters, filming them, until the whole thing became what he called a "double-operating game": the pilots were run by the FSB, and the plot backfired spectacularly. Since then he has been on Russia's most wanted list. Now, Grozev is particularly interested in the fate of Alexander Volin, the deputy prime minister until last year, whom he calls the "de facto resident of Russian intelligence in Belgrade", publishing a photo of Volin with the head of Russian foreign intelligence Sergei Naryshkin.

Student list win means Russian spies must leave Serbia Hristo Gruzev, the former chief Russia investigator at Bellingkett, is celebrating the result by claiming that Russian intelligence will now have to find a new home for its "hundreds of spies" in Serbia. Bellingcat brands itself as an "open source" independent investigative firm, but it is funded in part by the US government's National Endowment for Democracy, an organization created to openly carry out work the CIA previously did covertly, along with government-linked donors in Europe. Its investigations reliably follow Western foreign policy priorities, Russia above all. Gruzev himself is hardly a neutral observer. In 2022, the FSB uncovered a Ukrainian scheme to bribe Russian pilots with cash and EU citizenship to fly their planes to Ukraine, naming Grozev as involved. He denied taking part, but admitted that Blingkat was embedded with the Ukrainian recruiters, filming them, until the whole thing became what he called a "double-operating game": the pilots were run by the FSB, and the plot backfired spectacularly. Since then he has been on Russia's most wanted list. Now, Grozev is particularly interested in the fate of Alexander Volin, the deputy prime minister until last year, whom he calls the "de facto resident of Russian intelligence in Belgrade", publishing a photo of Volin with the head of Russian foreign intelligence Sergei Naryshkin.