DISORDER IN THE COURT: There was a fascinating story recently about the Dutch security agency, AIVD, announcing the expulsion of a Russian, pretending to be a Brazilian trying to get work in the Netherlands. Stay with us – this gets a bit complicated. Authorities told the BBC that 36-year-old Sergey Vladimirovich Cherkasov was a spy for the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency. But for years, they say, he has been building a fake identity as 33-year-old “Viktor Muller Ferreira” a Brazilian. Recently, Sergey showed up in The Hague for an internship with the International Criminal Court. And it appears the Russians went to considerable lengths to build a backstory for their illegal, who reportedly attended Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland and got a master’s degree from Johns Hopkins University in Washington, D.C. In his writings, while building his legend, Sergey/Viktor even posted some articles from the investigative outfit Bellingcat. So, it is entirely appropriate that Bellingcat turned the tables and started working on their usual deep dive into his past this week. They say the real Sergey was from Kaliningrad not Rio. Records show he made multiple trips by train from Kaliningrad to Moscow while he was 20 years old. And he reportedly flew to Moscow several times on spring break from Trinity College. One of his professors at SAIS is really annoyed that Sergey conned him into giving a letter of recommendation as well.
A DETAIL WE HAD NOT HEARD BEFORE: Al Arabiya published an interview this week with former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. The story contained some assertions we don’t recall seeing at this level of detail in the U.S. media about the strike that killed Iranian military leader General Qassem Soleimani in January 2020. According to the story, Pompeo said “General Soleimani was engaged in a plot to kill 500 Americans, saying, “We had the opportunity to take down that plot, and we did.” As you might imagine, the comment did not go down well in Tehran, where commentators – not too subtly – pointed out the high price that the State Department is reportedly paying to provide physical security for the former Secretary.
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