Expelled five years ago after the espionage scandal between Sofia and Moscow, REL

Expelled five years ago after the espionage scandal between Sofia and Moscow, REL: Russian diplomat expelled from Bulgaria appears in Serbia

Russian diplomat Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Krasii was accredited this year as assistant military attaché to Serbia, five years after Bulgarian media reported that he had been expelled from the country as part of a spy scandal that erupted between Sofia and Moscow.

Data leaked from Russian databases shows that Aleksandr Krasii has ties to Russia's military intelligence service (GRU), Systema, the Russian-language investigative unit of Radio Free Europe (RFE/RL), has learned.

Neither the Bulgarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs nor the Bulgarian Prosecutor's Office responded to REL's request for information regarding the case.

REL's research shows that Krasii was in Serbia for a year after his expulsion from Bulgaria, but his name appeared on the diplomatic list as assistant military attaché only in 2026.

The Russian diplomat was expelled amid an investigation in Bulgaria into a series of explosions at weapons depots, which at the time were suspected of being carried out by Russian nationals.

Moscow denied any involvement in these incidents. Former diplomat and consultant on geopolitical and security issues, Nikolla Llunic, told REL that this case shows that the stance of Serbian institutions towards this issue, which has been present for a long time, has not changed.

"The security services must carry out the duty assigned to them by the Constitution and protect the state from a security and counterintelligence perspective. You [REL] pointed this out in 2023, but the institutions did not react in any way," Llunic said.

In a 2023 investigation, REL identified three Russian diplomats who began their diplomatic missions in Serbia after being expelled or blacklisted by European Union countries in the months following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

At the time, REL determined that one of them had ties to a unit of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), accused of cyberattacks on the United States energy sector, while another had ties to Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service.

One of them continues to serve as a Russian diplomat in Serbia. The media revealed the diplomat's identity Bulgaria's Ministry of Foreign Affairs expelled another Russian diplomat at the end of April 2021.

As stated in a statement issued on April 29, the expulsion was part of a series of expulsions, while the Russian ambassador was summoned for talks.

Although the ministry did not disclose his identity, Bulgarian media revealed it.

The private news agency Zona News and the Bulgarian public broadcaster reported two days later that it was Lieutenant Colonel Aleksandr Krasii, who was an assistant to the Russian military attaché.

Zona News said it had received this information "from its sources," while later stating that the public broadcaster had received the information from it without citing the source.

The agency reported that Krasii was supposed to leave Bulgaria no later than May 5th.

According to Bulgarian National Television, Krasii became a diplomat of that country at the end of 2020 and arrived in Bulgaria at the beginning of 2021.

It was also reported that during his four-month stay, he had only made one public engagement: on behalf of Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, he had presented a decoration to an activist of the Russophile association in Bulgaria. The association's website published a report on the event, as well as a photo of Krasii with its members.

REL did not receive a response from Bulgarian National Television or Zona News regarding how they determined that Krasii was the expelled diplomat, while the Russophile association did not respond regarding his expulsion from Bulgaria either.

From Bulgaria to Serbia A little over a year after the expulsion, Krasii was photographed at an event at the University of Defense in Belgrade.

He was photographed among instructors and participants attending advanced training at the National Defense School, a military educational institution.

REL identified Krasii, among other things, based on the markings on the uniform he wore at that event, which read "AA Krasii". The name Aleksandar Krasii first appeared on the diplomatic list in 2026. This list is the official register of foreign diplomats, which is periodically updated and published by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Serbia.

That same year, REL identified him at two events in Belgrade.

In April, he attended a wreath-laying ceremony before a meeting of the Serbian-Russian Intergovernmental Committee for Trade, Economic and Scientific-Technical Cooperation.

A few weeks later, in May, he was photographed taking part in the "Immortal Regiment" march, a ceremony that originated in Russia, where it was first organized in 2012 to commemorate Red Army soldiers killed during World War II.

The Serbian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Russian Embassy did not respond to REL's request for regarding Krasii's diplomatic mission in Serbia.

Deported amid investigation into explosions and poisoning Krasii was deported from Bulgaria amid an investigation in which six Russian citizens were accused of involvement in a series of explosions that occurred over a ten-year period.

At the time, Bulgarian prosecutors stated that there was a “reasonable suspicion” that explosions that hit four warehouses and production facilities in Bulgaria between 2011 and 2020 were linked to the poisoning of Bulgarian arms dealer Emilian Gebrev in 2015, as well as an explosion at ammunition depots in the Czech Republic in 2014.

A spokesman for the Prosecutor General's Office stated at the time that it could be concluded that "the purpose of the actions of Russian citizens was to interrupt the supply of special products to Georgia and Ukraine."

In 2015, arms dealer Emilian Gebrev began vomiting during dinner at a restaurant in Sofia. He was then taken to a military hospital, where he experienced severe hallucinations and fell into a coma. His son also fell ill suddenly, as did the director of Gebrev's arms trading company EMCO.

Gebrev eventually recovered.

At the time, investigators linked the entire case to the Czech Republic. In 2021, the country accused Russia's military intelligence service, the GRU, of being behind an October 2014 act of sabotage in the town of Vrbetice, where 50 tons of ammunition exploded and two people died.

The Bulgarian Prosecutor's Office did not respond to REL regarding the progress of the aforementioned investigation or whether Russian diplomat Aleksandr Krasii is also part of it.

Addresses of Russian intelligence officers Krasii's connections to Russia's military intelligence service are indicated by his addresses, Systema has learned.

In most leaked Russian databases, including, for example, the state services database “Gosuslugi”, the data of one of the largest private laboratories in Russia, Gemotest, as well as a health insurance database, Krasii lists his residential address as “Devichye Pole, no. 4”, in Moscow.

This is not a residential building, but the headquarters of the Joint Academy of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, one of Russia's leading military educational institutions.

It appears that Krasii has only given his real address on a few occasions.

One such case was when he applied for so-called “COVID permits,” introduced in 2020 and required for movement around Moscow during the lockdown. For these permits, applicants had to provide the departure and arrival points of their trips.

In all five permits Krasii received in the spring of 2020, the starting point was an address on “Marshal Biryuzov” Street: once without a building number, once with the number 2, once with the number 7, and twice with the number 4.

According to investigative journalists, the latter address houses apartments for the families of officers studying at the so-called "Conservatory", or the Military Diplomatic Academy.

Many future officers and operatives of the Russian military intelligence, the GRU, graduated from this academy and lived at that address. Among them is Anatoly Chepiga, who took part in the attempted poisoning of Russian double agent Sergei Skripal in 2018 in Salisbury, England. Considering that, according to Bulgarian media reports, Krasii was already assigned to the Russian consulate in Bulgaria at the end of 2020, it seems that his assignment there occurred immediately after completing his studies at the “Conservatory”.

According to leaked data, Krasii spent almost two years, from 2013 to 2015, in the town of Gorny, in the Russian Zabaikalsky Krai.

Gorny is one of 40 closed cities in Russia, meaning that special permission is required to enter it.

Gorny is closed because until 2002 it was to the 4th Strategic Missile Division of Russia's Strategic Missile Forces.

The division was later disbanded, and according to official data, Gorny is currently to several units of the Russian Armed Forces, none of which are related to strategic missiles or nuclear weapons. However, Gorny has retained its status as a closed city to this day.

This is not the first known case where GRU officers serving abroad have previously lived in closed military towns in Russia.

GRU officer Yuri Mikheev, who operates under diplomatic cover in African countries, lived from 2010 to 2015 in the closed town of Ozerny, in the Tver region, which, like Gorny, is linked to Russia's Strategic Missile Forces.

Another expelled diplomat remains in Serbia Krasii is not the only Russian diplomat who, after being expelled from an EU country, ended up in a diplomatic mission in Serbia.

Hundreds of Russian diplomats were expelled from EU member states or blacklisted in the months following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

REL found that at least three of these diplomats became accredited representatives of Russia in Serbia, including two who had ties to Russian intelligence services.

Russian diplomats were not expelled from Serbia in 2022 because, unlike most European countries, Serbia did not impose sanctions on Moscow and continues to maintain close relations with Russia.

Among others, Alexey Ivanenko appeared on Serbia's diplomatic list after being expelled from Croatia in 2022.

Leaked Russian government databases show that Ivanenko worked as an “engineer” in military unit 71330, another name for the 16th Center of the Russian FSB.

Ivanenko still appears on Serbia's latest diplomatic list, published in September.

Serbian authorities did not respond to REL's research in 2023.

"Center of Russian intelligence activities" Former diplomat Nikola Lunić told REL that the fact that the "expelled diplomats" found a base in Serbia raises suspicions that Belgrade is a "center of Russian intelligence activities."

"Serbia has created an environment where Russia can maintain the diplomatic capacities that it is losing in some parts of the European Union. In this way, Russia's diplomatic capacities are increasing, which, as a rule, is accompanied by the growth of its intelligence capabilities," he said.

REL's 2023 research showed that the number of Russian diplomats increased from 2022 to 2023, at a time when EU countries were expelling Russian diplomats due to the invasion of Ukraine.

However, the number of Russian diplomats is even higher now.

The diplomatic list of September 2026 contains 79 Russian diplomats, compared to 62 in 2023./REL