Revealed: How Russia’s security service preys on young activists to turn them into informants

Now he says he is seeking asylum in the Netherlands, as he walks warily around the canals of Amsterdam, telling CNN about his recruitment as an informant, his betrayal of the opposition groups he joined, and why he got out. “If we believe their words, they really think that the CIA is trying to facilitate a revolution in Russia and that Navalny is an agent from the CIA,” Sokolov said of the FSB, the service that replaced the KGB when the Soviet Union fell. “They deploy huge amounts of resources and effort not to let the revolution happen in Russia. They are looking for a foreign enemy.” He says the FSB is also “obsessed” with understanding who might succeed Alexey Navalny, poisoned and now imprisoned, as leader of the country’s opposition movement.Again, there was a huge interest on what outside involvement, if any, there might be from Western intelligence organizations. “There were other more complex tasks — to find out whether there is any cooperation with the West or find out what was happening behind the scenes in a particular organization, if the opposition is working for American or other foreign special services,” he said.Osipov said he too was sent to Georgia where he was told to monitor the views of the Russian community, especially about the war in Ukraine and how other countries and non-governmental organizations were helping Ukrainian refugees.”As soon as the war started, my handler asked me to find out how the community generally feels about the invasion of Ukraine,” he said. “The FSB was also interested in any cooperation with Western security services or if anyone is receiving finances from abroad.”The fear was always what danger there could be to the Kremlin and Putin, he said. “Russian security services are very well aware of the history of our country,” Osipov said. “When a huge immigrant community emerges abroad, where people speak freely to each other, work on projects together, help Ukrainian refugees, basically create a mini-Russia abroad, which is not under the control of FSB — they are afraid that history will repeat itself as it was in 1917 when Lenin came to Moscow and started a revolution,” he added.”They are afraid that their regime will be impacted now during this war.”He says he is speaking now to try to right some of his wrongs and perhaps offer some protection for his mother who is still in Russia. “I really want to get back home,” he said. “I do not hate the country, I hate our government,” Osipov added.Back in Amsterdam, Mikhail Sokolov said it was the shock of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24 that overwhelmed his fears of repercussions and forced him to turn his back on the FSB. “I hate the way Russia is now. I hate everything connected to Russia now, the fact that they began war against our brotherly nation, my brotherly nation,” he said. CNN’s Matthew Chance and Katharina Krebs reported this story from Amsterdam and London, and Rachel Clarke wrote in Atlanta.