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Mikhail Khodorkovsky

@khodorkovsky_en

Jun 9

“They’ve lost their fear.” A spy who inspired “The Americans” uses “Putin’s Davos” to suggest blowing up LNG tankers bound for Europe.

(🧵Here’s what else he said)

His name is Andrei Bezrukov. For two decades he lived in the U.S. under a stolen Canadian identity, residing in Cambridge, Massachusetts, as Harvard-educated consultant “Donald Heathfield.”

[2/12]thecrimson.com/article/2010/7…

He worked with his wife Elena Vavilova, who was posing as real estate agent “Tracey Foley.” At the time of the arrest, they had two sons, 20 and 16, who had no idea their parents were spies for a foreign country.

[3/12]

Read 12 tweets

Mikhail Khodorkovsky

@khodorkovsky_en

Jun 8

Imagine this: terrorists take 900 people hostage. They have political demands, offer to release 10 people a day. They name the opposition MP they're ready to talk to.

The MP agrees—but the president stops him, afraid the MP's rating might rise... 🧵[1/7]

That president was Vladimir Putin, and the opposition MP was Boris Nemtsov. The 2002 Nord-Ost theater siege was one of the moments that came to define Putin's presidency.

He chose to use a fentanyl-based gas to knock out the terrorists and then sent in special forces to kill them off.

[2/7]

The problem: the gas didn't selectively work on terrorists only—it also affected hostages. The medics who went in didn't know how to revive them because they weren't given an antidote.

130 people ended up dying, and we don't know how many more could've been saved had Nemtsov been allowed to negotiate.

[3/7]

Read 7 tweets

Mikhail Khodorkovsky

@khodorkovsky_en

Jun 6

Imagine a foreign government doesn't like what your country is doing, and decides to change it. Without asking you.

That's what Putin is doing in the Baltic states. He just got his first big win in Latvia. 🧵 [1/13]

On May 7, Ukrainian drones, pushed off course by Russian electronic warfare, entered Latvia from Russia. One exploded at an oil depot in Rēzekne: four empty fuel tanks were destroyed — luckily, no one was hurt.

[2/13]

You'd think that should have been the end of it — instead, three days later, Latvia's defense minister resigned. Four days after that, the government collapsed altogether.

Essentially, a NATO country's cabinet was removed from power by a hybrid operation conducted by the Kremlin.

[3/13]

Read 13 tweets

Mikhail Khodorkovsky

@khodorkovsky_en

Jun 2

Remember the pig heads at the Paris mosques? Or the Jewish centers painted green?

I knew exactly whose work it was the moment I saw it. Now — I finally have the proof. 🧵 [1/19]

My colleagues at the @dossier_center have obtained a large internal leak from a Moscow company called the Social Design Agency, or SDA.

It is run by a political operative named Ilya Gambashidze, the Kremlin is contracting him to manufacture scandals.

[2/19]

Their work is divided into two parts: online and offline. Online, the SDA writes fake news and posts fake videos. Offline, it pays crews from the Balkans to stage real stunts on European streets.

It's now abundantly clear that many of Europe's "spontaneous" scandals originated in Moscow.

[3/19]

Read 20 tweets

Mikhail Khodorkovsky

@khodorkovsky_en

May 26

"Privacy. That's iPhone." Apple pulled 1,213 apps from its Russian App Store last year at the Kremlin's request — more than from China, Vietnam, India, Korea, and the U.S. combined.

🧵 Most were VPN apps used to access WhatsApp

To understand why they're doing this, you have to look at what the Kremlin wants people to use instead — a state messenger called MAX, built by VK, whose CEO is the son of Kremlin domestic policy adviser Sergei Kiriyenko. It's an app with a back door for security services.

[2/12]

A federal law passed in 2025 required MAX to be pre-installed on every smartphone sold in Russia by September. The design follows China's WeChat: one app for messages, payments, government services, digital passport, medical insurance, and tax records.

[3/12]

Read 12 tweets

Mikhail Khodorkovsky

@khodorkovsky_en

May 25

The Kremlin has a plan for the Armenian NGOs left stranded after USAID's collapse: take them over.

Leaked documents obtained by @dossier_center show it's just one piece of Moscow's effort to derail Armenia's pivot to the West 🧵[1/21]

Dossier Center has obtained internal Kremlin-linked strategy documents showing how Russian political consultants have been trying to influence Armenia's election by building, from nothing, an entire ecosystem of opposition to Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.

[2/21]

Publicly, Putin claims (of course) Moscow doesn't interfere in Armenian politics. Privately, Kremlin-linked consultants coordinated polling, messaging, coalition planning, media operations, and campaign strategy to weaken Pashinyan and halt Armenia's pivot to the West.

[3/21]

Read 21 tweets

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