Hunting for Bellingcat: The Russian Federation was wanted
" The Russian edition of "Mediazone" in Telegram published a card of Grozev from the search base of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation, which lists the personal data of the journalist. However, the "reason for search" column states only that Grozev is wanted under the Criminal Code. The source of RIA reported that a criminal case was initiated against the journalist about the dissemination of false information on the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.
At the same time, Grozev himself reported that the reason for the search was unknown. "I have no idea on what basis the Kremlin has made me on" wanted ", so I cannot give any comments at the moment. In some sense it does not matter - for many years they made it clear that they are afraid of our work and will not stop What to get rid of it, ”he wrote on Twitter.
An independent international edition of Bellingcat was founded on July 14, 2014 by Eliot Higgins and initially engaged in journalistic investigations of events in hostilities, based on the analysis of open source data. In Russia, Bellingcat's activities and, in particular, Christ Grozev was investigating the poisoning of the opposition policies Alexei Navalny. The investigation found that eight FSB staff were involved in this.
In July 2022, the Prosecutor General's Office of Russia recognized as "unwanted organizations" the portal of Bellingcat journalistic investigations, and Grozev himself was recognized as a foreign agent. In response, the Bulgarian journalist wrote that the decision of the Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation is jeopardizing any cooperation or even a reference to Bellingcat in Russia.