Security expert Andrei Soldatov said the work of the Kremlin's intelligence services, then and now, has been defined by threats from dissidents abroad. That's how it caught Sidney Reilly, a Ukrainian-born agent who worked for Britain both inside Russia and abroad. He was befriended there by Ramon Mercader, who pretended to be sympathetic to Trotsky's ideas but in reality was a Soviet agent. While living in exile in Munich in 1959, Bandera, 50, was killed after being confronted by a Soviet agent with a gun that sprayed cyanide. Former KGB agent Oleg Kalugin suggested in 1992 that the attack had been planned by the Soviet Union and Bulgaria, which had asked Moscow for help in the assassination.

Source: ABC News May 03, 2024 04:38 UTC