News & Investigations

On May 9, the Russian Embassy in the Republic of Cyprus staged grand celebrations in honor of the main holiday of Putin’s pagan cult of pobedobesiye, the so-called Victory Day — dedicated to an event 85 years ago, to which modern Russia has no relation whatsoever, but which the Kremlin actively uses in propaganda of its own superiority and for the ideological justification of aggression against Ukraine. The culmination of the celebration was the performance of the main ritual

Russia’s Hybrid Influence in Cyprus: How Moscow’s Intelligence Networks Are Attempting to Undermine European Solidarity Against the backdrop of the EU summit in Nicosia and Ayia Napa, Russian entities have stepped up their dissemination of disinformation and their reliance on local political forces under their control. This involves not only propaganda but also systematic efforts to destabilize the situation within the country. Narratives Aimed at Division The Russian

During the EU summit in Nicosia and Ayia Napa, Cyprus became a target of Russia’s hybrid influence. While European Union leaders gathered to discuss current affairs, the Russian propaganda machine has been working tirelessly to manipulate public opinion in Cyprus, flooding the information space with Kremlin narratives intended to sow distrust among Cypriots toward European institutions. The goal of these efforts is to cast doubt on European solidarity, replace facts with fals

Excerpt from a book currently in preparation Russia’s embassy serves as the center of its legal intelligence activities in any country. It houses the residencies of all special services (the 5th Service of the FSB, the SVR, the GRU, and Rossotrudnichestvo), which are only formally subordinate to the ambassador. During the Soviet era, 60 to 80% of embassy diplomatic staff were intelligence officers. As John Barron wrote, «Because the KGB fills many Soviet embassies with such a

Geneva and Vienna have long served as convenient platforms for Russian intelligence in Europe, because there are many international organizations there in which there are many Russian representatives. Positions in secretariats, translation and protocol services, access to databases and diplomatic infrastructure give the Russian Federation’s special services an opportunity to embed their agents without hindrance. And then these structures begin to function not as platforms for

On May 9, 2025, a day sacred to Putin’s propaganda, a group of five members of the European Parliament arrived in Moscow. The group included: Ruth Firmenich and Michael von der Schulenburg from Germany, members of the left-wing party «Sandra Wagenknecht’s Alliance.» Ľuboš Blaha from Slovakia, a member of the ruling Smer party. Ondřej Dostál, an independent MP from the Czech Republic. Fidias Panayiotou, an independent member of the Republic of Cyprus. The Russian media covered

Operation Zorro: Russian special services begin destabilizing Cyprus ahead of elections A covert phase of the parliamentary election campaign has begun in Cyprus—not through political programs and debates, but through Russian-language propaganda and street leaflets. On October 2, 2025, the pro-Kremlin website Cyprus Butterfly published a manifesto calling for an «uprising» against the Cypriot authorities. Leaflets with the same content were distributed in Nicosia the day befo

Russian embassies in most countries around the world differ from diplomatic missions of other countries in their inexplicably bloated...

In late April, European media reported that a 59-year-old Georgian native with Greek citizenship was arrested in the Greek city of...

Dmitry Khmelnitsky Boris Demash On October fifth, 2023, a diplomatic scandal broke out in Cyprus. Rossiyskaya Gazeta correspondent...

For Soviet and Russian security services, recruitment of foreign nationals was the most important method of work. This practice, which...

A new political party "Elpis" has been established in Cyprus. The party sees one of its main tasks in the active development of ties with...

Jan Marsalek’s alleged plot to control Austria’s intelligence agency could have given Putin direct access to sensitive Western...

The recent statement by Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto about the attack on the infrastructure of the Druzhba oil pipeline...

CIRen An investigation into leaked data exposes scam call centers whose employees convinced thousands of people to make “investments” on...