How Russian and Belarusian security services recruit and break their own dissidents

In an analysis of the Russian and Belarusian opposition, political scientist Andis Kudors writes that both countries' security services actively hunt for weak points among dissidents and coerce people into cooperation through blackmail.

One example is former Pussy Riot member Margarita Konovalova, revealed in August to have been an FSB informant under the codename "Harley". After her home was searched in 2023 and her mother's life was threatened, she agreed to gather information on opposition circles. In 2025 she was reportedly tasked with luring Mediazona publisher Pyotr Verzilov to Serbia, where Russian agents allegedly planned to kill him.

The Belarusian case

Kudors also recalls the 2021 incident in which Lukashenko's regime forced a Ryanair flight to land in Minsk in order to detain NEXTA editor Roman Protasevich and his girlfriend Sofia Sapega. The episode led the EU to ban flights over Belarusian airspace and effectively ended Latvia-Belarus diplomatic relations. Protasevich was sentenced to eight years in prison but pardoned by Lukashenko just three weeks later; by 2025 he was hosting a propaganda show on Belarusian state television.

Russian practices

According to Kudors, Putin's regime relies on "selective justice" and "telephone justice", persecutes and even kills political opponents — citing Anna Politkovskaya, Boris Nemtsov and Alexei Navalny — and, as documented by Freedom House, conducts transnational repression against citizens abroad. The article also mentions Ksenia Sobchak, once seen as an opposition figure, who later aligned herself with Kremlin propaganda.

Kudors concludes that not all Russians living abroad serve the Kremlin, but some opposition organizations may still create additional security risks for European countries.