MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia’s justice ministry said on Friday it had designated Andrei Kozyrev, the country’s first post-Soviet foreign minister who later became a fierce critic of President Vladimir Putin, as a “foreign agent”.
Kozyrev, who is 74 and lives in the United States, served as Russian foreign minister under then President Boris Yeltsin after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union at a time when a liberalising Russia maintained warm relations with Western countries.
Having moved to the U.S. in 2010, Kozyrev became an outspoken critic of Putin’s policies and later of Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine.
Shortly after the outbreak of war in 2022, Kozyrev urged his former colleagues in the Russian foreign ministry to resign in protest.
The justice ministry in a statement accused him of distributing false information about Russian government policies and about the Russian military. It also noted his opposition to what Moscow calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine and his alleged cooperation “with foreign platforms”.
Asked to comment on his designation, Kozyrev said it reflected what he called “the stupidity of the regime”.
“I am glad to join those noble people who have likewise been designated foreign agents,” he said.
The “foreign agent” designation carries a negative Soviet-era connotation and obliges people to identify themselves as foreign agents on social media and in other publications. It also exposes them to burdensome financial reporting requirements inside Russia.
Other public figures, writers, cultural figures and journalists who have angered the authorities by speaking out against the war in Ukraine have received the same designation.
(Reporting by Reuters; Writing by Felix Light; Editing by Andrew Osborn)
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