The house of an American spy who fled Russia was discovered
New details are emerging in the story of a valuable American agent allegedly taken from Moscow, as CNN reported yesterday.
According to the TV channel, in 2017, “the most valuable informant of the American intelligence services in the power structures of the Russian Federation” was urgently evacuated from Russia. The agent was taken out after a meeting between the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry and US President Donald Trump, allegedly out of fears that the US head of state could give out the informant’s name to Russia.
The name of the spy was not mentioned, but information appeared online that we could be talking about ex-employee of the Russian Presidential Administration Oleg Smolenkov, who went on vacation to Montenegro with his family in June 2017 and disappeared there without a trace.
It is noted that Smolenkov worked as a secretary at the Russian Embassy in the United States in Washington and in the apparatus of the Russian government in 2010, by decree of President Medvedev, Smolenkov was awarded the rank of active state adviser of the Russian Federation, 3rd class (corresponding to the military rank of major general).
After his disappearance, the security forces opened a criminal case under the article “Murder”, but in the end the FSB found out that the alleged victim was alive and in another country.
The publication found on The Washington Post website in the section on real estate sales information about the acquisition on June 5, 2018 of a house in the city of Stafford (Virginia) worth about 925 thousand dollars by certain Oleg and Antonina Smolenkov. This is the name of the wife of the missing Smolenkova; she also worked in the government apparatus
A photo of the mansion is on the website of one of the local real estate agencies. Its area is about 760 square meters. The house stands on a plot of 1,2 hectares. The mansion has six bedrooms and six bathrooms. In addition, the network contains information about the registration of a property management agreement in the name of Oleg and Antonina Smolenkov, executed on January 28, 2019.
At the same time, the data of the newspaper’s interlocutors in the government agencies of the Russian Federation, who knew Smolenkov, vary about whether he could convey truly valuable information to the Americans.
Some argue that he was not doing substantive work, but rather technical work: purchasing, organizing trips, personal errands for his superiors, and could not tell the Americans anything other than common rumors.
Others point out that Smolenkov worked at the Russian Embassy in Washington at the time when Yuri Ushakov, the current assistant to the Russian President for international affairs, was the ambassador. Some sources claim that Smolenkov continued to work with Ushakov after his and his return to Moscow and enjoyed the trust of a high-ranking official with direct access to Vladimir Putin.
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