US Indictment Details Russian Plot to Kill Dissident in Lithuania
US prosecutors have accused former Russian intelligence officer Yuri Khrameev of offering a US citizen $25,000 to kill a target in Lithuania's capital.
A former officer in Russia's military intelligence services, Yuri Khrameev, has been accused by US prosecutors of offering a US citizen $25,000 to track down and kill a person in Lithuania's capital, Vilnius.
The intended target was described in the indictment as someone who was "telling lies about Russia."
The case, unsealed in the United States, points to what prosecutors describe as a broader Russian network organised to carry out assassinations abroad. The allegations place the operation in Lithuania, a NATO and European Union member state, and involve a US citizen recruited for the task.
The indictment identifies Khrameev as a former military officer who had served in Russian intelligence. It does not name the intended victim, and the wire accounts do not specify the outcome of the alleged plot or the current status of the accused.
The disclosure adds to a series of Western investigations in recent years into suspected Russian covert operations on European soil, which Moscow has consistently rejected as baseless.