BBC profiles Russian exile who says his surveillance network tracked General Staff officer Fanil Sarvarov before his assassination in Moscow

BBC profiles Russian exile who says his surveillance network tracked General Staff officer Fanil Sarvarov before his assassination in Moscow

In December 2025, Lieutenant General Fanil Sarvarov, head of the Russian Armed Forces General Staff’s Operational Training Directorate, was killed in a car bombing in Moscow. A Russian man who left the country in 2022 and now coordinates a network of volunteers tracking Russian military personnel says he helped prepare the killing. His role is detailed in the BBC documentary ”Traitors, Patriots, Spies: Shadowmen Helping Ukraine Inside Russia.”