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Shaun Walker is the Guardian’s central and eastern Europe correspondent and author of The Illegals: Russia’s Most Audacious Spies and the Plot to Infiltrate the West.
He tells Helen Pidd about the history of Russia’s ‘Illegals’ programme, and how Russian intelligence operates in western countries today.
“It’s become much harder for Russia to send its operatives abroad,” Shaun tells Helen. “What we’re seeing, with those traditional programmes like the illegals and assassins, is a new campaign of sabotage across Europe that actually doesn’t require Russia’s spies even to leave Russian territory and uses proxies to carry out the act.”
They also discuss the impact on the children of Russian illegals. You can read Shaun’s Long Read about one of those stories, ‘I am not who you think I am’: how a deep-cover KGB spy recruited his own son.
Shaun will be speaking alongside Christo Grozev and Daniela Richterova at a Guardian Live event on Thursday 22 May 2025. You can buy tickets here.
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