Moscow's Federal Security Service (FSB), on Monday, said that it detained a Russian citizen and former US consulate employee in Vladivostok for allegedly passing information about the ongoing war in Ukraine to American diplomats. The FSB in a statement said, it "suppressed the illegal activities of Robert Robertovich Shonov," Russian state news agency TASS reported.
Shonov had been handing information to American diplomats since September. He reportedly passed on information regarding the conflict and mobilisation of citizens, a move that led to several military-aged men leaving the country. Shonov had worked for the U.S. consulate in Vladivostok for more than 25 years until 2021, according to a Moscow Times report.
He allegedly reported to two diplomats in the political department in the US embassy in Moscow, Jeffrey Silin and David Bernstein-- the FSB planned to interrogate them too. The development is the latest in the spate of incidents that have put pressure on relations between the US and Russia.
The FSB also alleged that ahead of presidential elections in Russia next year, Shonov had been asked to gauge protest sentiments in the country. In May, the US embassy said that the allegations were 'without merit' and added that, the "only role at the time of his arrest was to compile media summaries of press items from publicly available Russian media sources".