From Hillary Clinton Emails To A Deadly Attack: How A Russian Trail Turned Lethal
The Russian agents who were implicated in the hacking of Hillary Clinton‘s 2016 presidential campaign emails have now been linked to the Salisbury poisonings.
What Happened: As per a report, Boris Antonov, Nikolai Kozachek, and Pavel Yershov, the Russian agents involved in the email hack, were among the 11 Russian military intelligence officers sanctioned by Britain last week.
The sanctions were a response to a public inquiry into the death of Dawn Sturgess, who was exposed to the nerve agent Novichok in 2018.
The inquiry found that the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency, was responsible for Sturgess’s death. Sturgess came into contact with the nerve agent after an unsuccessful assassination attempt on double agent Sergei Skripal, reports The Telegraph.
In reaction to the findings, the Foreign Office announced new sanctions against Moscow, including the entirety of the GRU.
Eight GRU officers were singled out for travel bans and asset freezes over hostile cyber-related acts, including targeting Skripal’s daughter, Yulia, with malware before the failed attempt to kill her father.
Six of these agents, including Antonov, Kozachek, and Yershov, are from the GRU’s elite Unit 26165, which hacked Ms. Skripal’s mobile phone five years before she and her father were poisoned with Novichok on the streets of Salisbury in 2018.
The remaining two agents are from a Kremlin-linked cyber division responsible for hybrid operations, including sabotage, physical threats, and attempted assassinations. Ms. Skripal’s phone was infected with X-agent malware in 2013, which GRU agents later used to track her travel from Moscow to the UK.
Why It Matters: This revelation underscores the extensive reach and capabilities of the GRU and its agents. The connection between the Clinton email hack and the Salisbury poisonings highlights the agency’s willingness to engage in both cyber warfare and physical attacks.
The sanctions imposed by Britain are a significant step towards holding the GRU accountable for its actions, and they send a clear message to other nations about the consequences of such hostile acts.
Read Next