Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it has become much more difficult for the security services to operate abroad. At least in European countries. Hundreds of intelligence officers, who had been working under diplomatic cover and overseeing the activities of agents of influence, were declared persona non grata and expelled to Russia. For many pro-Russian organisations and individual agents of influence, openly showing solidarity with Putin’s regime has simply become dangerous. The ‘Russkiy Mir’ Foundation, which previously openly funded hundreds upon hundreds of such organisations around the world, has been hit by sanctions. Its activities have been blocked in most democratic countries. Financial ties between the Western world and Russia have been virtually severed. 
In this situation, the authorities are seeking new ways of working with their old agents. 
One such discovery is the International Movement of Russophiles. It is interesting in that its name is very straightforward. Unlike many other similar organisations that masquerade as scientific, cultural or educational bodies, this is a society dedicated purely to love for Russia in general and Putin in particular. It does nothing else. 
The International Movement of Russophiles (IMR) was founded in Moscow on 14 March 2023 at its Founding Congress, held at the A.S. Pushkin State Museum. The congress was attended by 87 participants from 42 countries across all continents.    It was led by Nikolay Malinov, head of the Bulgarian national movement ‘Russophiles’, founded in 2003 – that is, already under Putin’s rule. This was apparently a desperate attempt by Moscow to rally and reorient as many of its agents as possible towards new tasks at a critical moment, amidst the catastrophic turn of events on the Russian-Ukrainian front and Russia’s loss of what remained of its political influence in the world. 
As reported, Valdemar Gerdt (Germany), Eli Hatem (Lebanon) and Fabrice Sorlin (France). 
Eli Hatem is a Paris-based lawyer with far-right connections who claimed in April 2024 that ‘foreign intelligence services’ were behind the terrorist attack at Moscow’s Crocus City Hall on 22 March 2024 .  
Fabrice Sorlin, a French Catholic activist and opponent of same-sex marriage, first visited Russia at Zhirinovsky’s invitation, and in 2015 moved with his family to a village near Moscow.  In 2024, Putin granted Russian citizenship to him, his wife and their nine children, three of whom were born in Russia.  Sorlin is the owner of a food import and export company. 
Malinov formulated the movement’s aims as follows: ‘To be a Russophile is to be a patriot of one’s own country. Because it is Russia that embodies traditional values, the idea of a strong state and the aspiration for a multipolar world – everything we want to see in our own countries. The antithesis of Russia is a world of Satanism that seeks to destroy us. We are neither right-wing nor left-wing. We stand for what is reasonable, good and eternal. And that is why we are Russophiles.” 
This text, undoubtedly concocted by Moscow-based curators, is intriguing in that it is not so much political as religious. Mystical. The world is divided into two parts – good and evil. Good is Russia; evil is Western democracies. To love good is to love Russia and Putin. Here, amongst other things, we can see the depths to which Russian propaganda has sunk today. There is nothing to latch onto. There is not a single universal human principle behind which it could previously hide, and which served as a cover. Democracy, justice, the struggle for peace, fairness – none of it works any more, not even as blatantly false demagoguery. 
There is nothing left but appeals to an irrational love for Russia, as if it were a divine realm of goodness. 
Konstantin Malofeev, another of the movement’s initiators, made a statement along the same lines as Malinov’s: ‘Russophiles are those who, first and foremost, love their country. Those who love Russia and the Russian people as a reflection of their own dream of freedom and independence. With such people, we will build a far better world than the one we entered the 21st century with: a multipolar world of free nations and traditional values, rather than the dictatorship of a single country imposing anti-Christian, anti-human, satanic abominations. I am certain that we, Russians and Russophiles, will surely prevail. For God is with us!’ According to the ‘Dossier’ centre, the movement’s ideological supervisor is Alexander Dugin. 
As Malinov stated at the founding meeting, the immediate goals of the International Movement of Russophiles are to collect one million signatures in Western countries calling for the lifting of anti-Russian sanctions, as well as to establish an Institute for Combating Russophobia and a competition that would serve as the antithesis of ‘Eurovision’.  All three objectives fall squarely within the remit of the Russian security services. As is customary, not a word is said about the sources of funding for the International Movement of Russophiles. 
Malinov’s background is highly characteristic. He was born in 1968 and studied history at Kyiv University – that is to say, he trained as a Soviet historian. A member of the Bulgarian Socialist Party (the successor to the Bulgarian Communist Party since 1990), he was the publisher of its newspaper from 2008 to 2015. In 2015, he left the party due to political differences with its leadership, in particular over its support for Ukraine in the conflict with Russia. In 2019, he was arrested on charges of spying for Russia, but was released on bail. Malinov was accused of carrying out assignments received from KGB and SVR generals Leonid Reshetnikov and Konstantin Malofeev, and of passing on information constituting state secrets to them with the aim of ‘influencing Bulgaria’s policy towards Russia and Western countries’.  According to a statement by Bulgaria’s Deputy Prosecutor General, “Malinov worked for the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies (RISI) and, from 2010, for the Russian non-governmental organisation ‘Society for the Development of Russian Historical Education “Double-Headed Eagle”’, passing on information about Bulgarian foreign policy to these organisations” . The trial began in 2021. Since February 2021, Malinov has been included on the US and UK sanctions lists. It appears that Malinov became a KGB agent whilst studying in Kyiv in the 1980s. 
Among the other foreign activists who founded the international movement of Russophiles, Waldemar Gerdt, head of the International Council of Russian Germans, stands out.
His background is also entirely typical of such figures. 
He was born in 1962 in Kazakhstan and graduated from an agricultural institute in 1984. This was followed by two years’ military service. Between 1989 and 1991, during the twilight of Soviet rule, he served as First Secretary of the Komsomol of Kazakhstan. He then spent two years as chairman of a collective farm, before emigrating to Germany in 1993. 
When a high-ranking Soviet ideological official (and the First Secretary of the Komsomol of a union republic is a major figure) emigrates to the West, there can be little doubt about his previous links with the secret services. 
Since 1996, Gerdt has been a businessman; since 2016, he has been a member of the right-wing party Alternative for Germany (AfD), known for its close ties to Moscow. Since 2017, he has been a member of the Bundestag for the AfD. He has a reputation as an extremely religious man, which is not particularly typical for a secretary of the Komsomol in a federal republic. Before joining the AfD, Gerdt was a member of the conservative Christian party (Partei Bibeltreuer Christen). The German Wikipedia describes Gerdt as a pro-Russian propagandist. In 2018, an investigation was carried out which revealed that staff with a reputation as right-wing extremists were working in the offices of 18 AfD members of the Bundestag. In particular, Gerdt employed Heinrich Grout, an activist in the Russian-German movement and also a well-known pro-Putin figure.  
In Cyprus, the leading Russophile is Mikis Filaniotis, who also has a background consistent with this profile. Filaniotis was born in 1956 and is a member of the Communist Party of Cyprus. After completing his military service, he was sent by the Communist Party to study in the USSR. He studied in Odessa. In 1983, he graduated with a degree in architecture. His wife is a Russian citizen. His two daughters are also Russian citizens. He is a member of the Association of Graduates of Soviet and Russian Universities, a member of the Expert Council of the Russian Centre for Science and Culture (RCSC), and a member of the Co-ordinating Council of the International Movement of Russophiles. He frequently visits Russia. In March 2019, he visited occupied Crimea, where he received an award from the occupying government of Crimea for taking part in a Kremlin propaganda campaign – he was a finalist in the 2020 online quiz ‘Crimea in the History of the Russian World’. Filaniotis is a member of the Co-ordinating Council of Russian Compatriots in Cyprus, and, since 2024, has been president of the Cyprus-Russia Friendship Society.  
The similarities in the biographies of all three foreign Russophiles are striking. They are all roughly the same age, all speak Russian, all studied at Soviet universities in the 1980s, and all found themselves in their respective countries acting as Kremlin propagandists at roughly the same time – during the twilight of Soviet power. They are all professionals. For each of them, the international Russophile movement is merely one of their roles.
Furthermore, an active member of the movement is the popular American blogger Jackson Hinkle. As the ‘Dossier’ centre writes, ‘He is the face of a new political movement known as MAGA-communism. MAGA, or ‘Make America Great Again’, is the slogan of Donald Trump’s political campaign, which advocates distinctly right-wing ideas: tightening immigration controls, protecting corporate interests, restricting women’s rights to abortion, opposing inclusivity, and so on. One might think all this is a far cry from communism. But MAGA-communism combines left-wing ideas with the support of Trump’s right-wing national-conservative followers.”  
As early as March 2023, an MDR branch was established in Australia. Moreover, its creation was announced by representatives of Australian Aboriginal communities. 
In May 2023, ‘Nikolai Malinov stated that the movement would endeavour to open branches in all countries where this did not contravene local legislation, and where this proved impossible, to rely on private initiatives by local residents’.  This most likely means that the MDR has secured sufficient funding to set up its centres and recruit agents worldwide. 
At the Second Russia–Africa Summit, held in July 2023 in St Petersburg, there was a separate section entitled ‘Development of the Russophile Movement in Africa’. Vladimir Kochev, executive director of the ‘Russkiy Mir’ Foundation, took part in the session and quite openly stated that ‘Proficiency in the Russian language allows one to receive information from Russia directly, without intermediaries’. The Russophiles’ movement also plans to erect a monument to Pushkin in Cameroon. 
A campaign by the Russophiles, which seemed amusing at first glance, took place in Venezuela: “Members of the presidential honour guard were briefed on Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine and its aspiration to establish a new world order… All those present expressed their willingness to support the MDR.” 
In Egypt, in July 2023, a round-table discussion entitled ‘Russophiles and their role in defending Russian culture’ took place. It was organised by the Rossotrudnichestvo representative office in Cairo, in conjunction with the Egypt–Russia Friendship Society and the Egyptian Association of Graduates of Russian and Soviet Universities.  This is a very typical situation in which, for the duration of an operation, several overseas offshoots of the Russian special services—masquerading as civil society organisations—join forces. 
In the same month of July 2023, the MDR’s first overseas office opened in Milan. It was headed by a certain Eliseo Bertolasi. The vice-chairman is Dr Mirko Preatoni. According to Insider magazine, Bertolasi is a research fellow at the pro-Kremlin Institute for Prospective Studies in Geopolitics and Auxiliary Sciences and a correspondent for the ‘Russia Today’ news agency. In 2018, Bertolasi led the Italian delegation to an agricultural forum in Crimea. Preatoni is the head of cultural affairs at the ‘Friends of Great Russia’ Association, founded in 2014.  The MDR immediately signed cooperation agreements with sister organisations – the ‘Veneto–Russia’ Cultural Association led by Palmarino Zoccatelli, the Verona-based ‘Russian House’ Association led by Marina Kholodenova, and the ‘Centre for Film Festivals and International Programmes’ Tatyana Shumova. 
In February 2024, the Second Congress of the MDR was held in Moscow, opening with a welcome address by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. The event was attended by 350 representatives of the movement from 130 countries around the world.  
In October 2024, Mikis Filaniotis, as head of the Cypriot branch of the International Movement of Russophiles, presented Cypriot singer Stefani Beloklavek with the first-place award at the 2nd International Festival of Russian Poetry, Song and Dance ‘May the Sun Always Shine’, which took place in Bulgaria. As reported by the RCNK website in Cyprus, “this year the festival brought together more than four thousand participants from nine countries: Belarus, Bulgaria, Greece, Egypt, Cyprus, Russia, Serbia, Turkey and Uzbekistan”. This list includes five European Union countries in which Moscow’s agents feel more or less at ease. Throughout the 20-odd years of Putin’s rule, the work of the Russian security services abroad has been extremely easy and completely unrestricted. Democratic countries are more or less successful in combating espionage and terrorism, but are virtually powerless against agents of influence who, on the face of it, do not break any laws. Freedom of speech and opinion is guaranteed by the constitution in a democracy. It is very difficult to discern the fine line between the activities of an agent of influence and espionage, and to catch such a figure red-handed, even if they make no secret of their sympathies whilst serving as a member of the Bundestag. 
The good times came to an end with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the imposition of sanctions against many of its institutions and the expulsion of a large number of diplomats acting as spies. Under these circumstances, the role of new organisations, such as the International Movement of Russophiles – with the same aims, new methods, but the same old personnel – is growing rapidly.