Free Blowing Up Russia by Alexander Litvinenko

employees of the Service for Combating Illegal Armed Formations and Banditry of the UFSB for Moscow and the Moscow Region arrived at RUOP and that one of them, Colonel Edward Artashesovich Abovian, obtained the release of the prisoner Yanin from custody? If this is so, did Colonel Abovian, in insisting on Yanin s release, have any basis for asserting, and did he, in fact, assert that he was carrying out instructions from his immediate superior, General Semeniuk, and that First Deputy Director of the FSB of the RF and head of the UFSB for Moscow and the Moscow Region, General Trofimov, was aware of this? Does Colonel Abovian have free access to the special technology and armaments, which the UFSB for Moscow and the Moscow Region has at its disposal? What connection, if any, exists

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between colonel Abovian and the commercial activities of the Mosinraschyot Bank and the Tver Beer Combine? 6. Is it true that on October 17 of this yea, employees of the ROOP of the Northern District of the City of Moscow detained a BMW 525 automobile with detachable number plates 41-34 MOK, which had previously been used by S.P. Kubitsky, whom I have already mentioned and who is better known in criminal circles as Vorkuta ? Did the automobile contain a driver who was carrying no documents and three passengers who showed the ROOP employees identity cards for employees of the UFSB for Moscow and the Moscow Region in the names of captain L.A. Dmitriev and Warrant Officer A.A.

Dokukin, following which they were released? Yours sincerely, Yury Shchekochikhin, Member of the Security Committee of the State Duma of the Russian Federation

Abovian, the FSB colonel working in the section for combating illegal bandit groups who is mentioned in Shchekochikhin s inquiry, was Lazovsky s controller at the FSB.

On November 23, 1996, First Deputy Minister of the Interior Vladimir Kolesnikov, sent Shchekochikhin a reply via the Duma committee in which he stated: Indeed& in the course of operations undertaken in Moscow to capture armed criminals in addition to Lazovsky, the persons handed over to the agencies of the Ministry of the Interior included individuals who presented identification from the agencies of law enforcement and other state services& Under the present state of measures taken, Lazovsky and the other accomplices stand accused of more than ten premeditated murders in various regions of Russia&

Kolesnikov avoided giving direct answers to the specific questions raised by Shchekochikhin in his inquiry. There was nothing to do but wait for the criminals to be brought to trial.

FSB director Kovalyov had two meetings with Shchekochikhin. At the end of the year, Shchekochikhin received two replies from him, essentially identical in content. One was secret and has remained in the archives of the State Duma. Shchekochikhin made the other, open reply public: The Federal Security Service has carried out an internal investigation into facts and circumstances presented in the Duma deputy s letter of inquiry in Novaya Gazeta&

Investigations have determined that the actions of the [UFSB employees] involved certain deviations from the requirements of departmental regulations which, in combination with a lack of practical experience and professionalism, could well have served as the cause of the incident which has attracted your attention. In this regard, particular concern is occasioned by the fact that a conflict occurred between the members of two departments which engage in operational and investigative activity in the criminal

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environment. Nonetheless, despite this regrettable misunderstanding, the main goal was achieved, since Lazovsky s gang was neutralized&

Kovalyov s particular concern was not occasioned by the collaboration of the UFSB for Moscow and the Moscow Region with organized criminal groups, terrorists, and underworld bosses, but by the actions of MUR employees under Tskhai s leadership.

As for the actual employees of the UFSB,