Trump administration reacts to Brazil's decision allowing alleged spy to return to Russia

'I thought I was going to heaven', says alleged Russian spy about Brazilian woman who allegedly helped him with false documents
President Donald Trump's government reacted to Brazil's decision to allow Sergey Vladimirovich Cherkasov - identified by the United States as a Russian spy - to leave the country and return to Russia.
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In a statement released this Wednesday (8), a spokesperson for the US State Department stated that the US is "deeply concerned" about the measure and that it weakens the joint commitment to combat foreign interference.
"The United States is deeply concerned about Brazil's decision to allow an individual with known links to Russian intelligence to leave the country", stated the State Department. foreign interference and protect the integrity of our democratic institutions."
The American government also asked that Brazil consider the precedent that will be created by the decision and work together with Washington to hold accountable people who, according to the USA, "threaten our collective security".
The Brazilian decision was published on Monday (6) in the Official Gazette of the Union. The government ordered Cherkasov's expulsion from the country and opened the way for him to be sent to Russia.
The measure, however, can only be carried out after the end of the sentence to which he was sentenced in Brazil or if there is an early release by the Judiciary. There is still no forecast of when the decision will be carried out.
Sergey Cherkasov has been imprisoned since 2022 in a federal penitentiary in Brasília. He is serving a five-year prison sentence for ideological falsehood.
He is identified by the Federal Police and the FBI (the American federal police) as a Russian intelligence agent who used a false Brazilian identity to work abroad. He lived for 12 years as a Brazilian.
However, investigators found no evidence that Cherkasov acted as a spy against Brazil. Its target would be the United States and European countries.
He denies, to this day, being a spy working for the Russian government.
Since Cherkasov was arrested, Americans and Russians have entered into a diplomatic dispute over his fate. Both Moscow and Washington even presented extradition requests to the Brazilian government, but with opposing versions of the accused's identity and actions.
With the Brazilian decision, an unusual chapter in relations between Brazil, Russia and the United States comes to an end.
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The battle for the Russian spy
Sergey Cherkasov is identified by the FBI and the Federal Police as an alleged Russian intelligence agent who used a Brazilian identity to disguise himself
Reproduction
The dispute involving Cherkasov officially began in August 2022, when Russia requested his extradition from the Federal Supreme Court (STF). Moscow alleged that he was wanted in the country for drug trafficking.
The version, however, began to be contested by the United States and Brazilian authorities, who stated that the accusation could be a Russian attempt to repatriate an alleged spy.
In March 2023, the case gained new chapters. The United States Department of Justice filed a criminal charge against Cherkasov, stating that he was an agent of the Russian military intelligence service, the GRU.
According to the US, Cherkasov had used the false identity of Victor Muller Ferreira to operate on American territory and infiltrate academic and political institutions.

Washington stated that he was part of the group known as "illegals", formed by Russian intelligence agents sent abroad with false identities.
In the same month, STF minister Luiz Edson Fachin, rapporteur of the case, authorized Cherkasov's extradition to Russia. The delivery, however, could not take place immediately, as Fachin conditioned his departure from the country on the conclusion of Brazilian investigations into the alleged agent's actions in national territory.
In April 2023, the United States also formally presented an extradition request to Brazil. Washington accused Cherkasov of acting as a foreign agent on American soil, in addition to involvement in financial fraud and irregularities related to obtaining visas.
In July 2023, the Brazilian Ministry of Justice denied the United States' extradition request. The ministry argued that the American request was unfounded because there had already been an extradition request from Russia approved by the STF.
Despite this, Cherkasov's surrender remained suspended due to investigations and pending legal matters in Brazil.
At the end of last year, the Federal Court and the Federal Public Ministry (MPF) reported that Cherkasov would no longer have any legal pending issues that would prevent him from being extradited.
The decision, then, depended on the Presidency of the Republic, as surrenders in extradition cases need to be deliberated by the head of the Executive Branch or the designated body for her. In this case, Cherkasov's case is being led by the Ministry of Justice and Public Security.
BBC News Brasil found that the situation was being discussed internally in the ministry together with the defense of the alleged spy and Russian diplomats.
The defense will forward the MJ's decision to the STF so that it can deliberate on the expulsion. The expectation is that if the STF orders the execution of the MJ's decision, he will immediately return to Russia.
How the spy network worked
Sergey Vladimirovich Cherkasov presented himself as Victor Muller Ferreira and had applied for an unpaid internship at the International Criminal Court. He is suspected of being a Russian spy.
United States Department of Justice/ Reproduction
The suspicion that Brazil was being used as a kind of "nursery" for Russian spies resurfaced last year after the publication of a report by the North American newspaper The New York Times.
According to the newspaper, an investigation led by the Brazilian Federal Police identified at least nine alleged Russian spies who used Brazilian documents as part of their disguises. The information was confirmed at the time by BBC News Brasil.
Part of this case was revealed by BBC News Brasil in reports between 2022 and 2024.
Based on documents and testimonies collected over months, BBC News Brasil revealed, for example, how Russia orchestrated a diplomatic operation to try to remove one of its alleged spies from prison and take him back to his home country.
Sources linked to the investigation told BBC News Brasil that, of the nine alleged Russian spies identified until last year, only one remains on Brazilian soil: Sergey Cherkasov. And it was with him that this intricate network of disguises came to light and began to collapse.
A network that, according to investigations, used unusual disguises. One of the alleged spies would have acted as the owner of a jewelry store in Brasília, another would have been a student passionate about forró while another would have worked as a model.
The discovery
Federal Police found several documents including passports with Sergey Cherkasov.

Some of them would be used, according to the investigations, in the process he was taking to obtain Portuguese citizenship
Federal Justice of São Paulo
In April 2022, Sergey Cherkasov was detained in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands, when he tried to enter the country and sent back to Brazil.
He presented himself as the Brazilian Victor Muller Ferreira and had been approved in an internship program at the International Criminal Court, in The Hague.
The investigations conducted by The Dutch, Americans and Brazilians point out that Cherkasov was an agent of the GRU, one of the intelligence services of the Russian Armed Forces.
Returned to Brazil, Cherkasov was arrested, prosecuted and sentenced to 15 years in prison in Brazil for using a false document. His sentence, however, was reduced to five years.
In Brazil, he was investigated for espionage, but the investigation was archived.
He is currently imprisoned in a federal penitentiary in Brasília. In the process, he admitted to having posed as a Brazilian, but always denied being a spy.
A few months later, in November 2022, the Norwegian police arrested another "Brazilian".
His name was José de Assis Giammaria, but authorities in the European country claim that he was actually called Mikhail Mikushin and was a Russian spy infiltrated at a university in the Arctic region, on the border between Norway and Russia.
The third case emerged shortly afterwards, at the end of 2022, when a Brazilian woman reported the disappearance of her boyfriend, also "Brazilian" Gerhard Daniel Campos.
The authorities, however, claimed that Campos was in reality another Russian spy named Artem Shmyrev. He left Brazil shortly before the Federal Police launched an operation to arrest him and was never seen again.
Last year's New York Times report listed six other people who had allegedly used Brazilian documents as part of their disguises: Yekaterina Leonidovna Danilova, Vladimir Aleksandrovich Danilov, Olga Igorevna Tyutereva, Aleksandr Andreyevich Utekhin, Irina Alekseyevna Antonova and Roman Olegovich Koval.
Utekhin, for example, according to investigations, disguised himself in Brasília as a jewelry businessman.
Another alleged spy, whose Brazilian name would be Maria Isabel Moresco Garcia, would act as a model.
According to investigations by the Federal Police, none of the alleged spies identified so far gathered information about Brazil.
The passage through the country, according to what was found, was part of a strategy to create a disguise solid enough to not attract attention in the countries where, in fact, the agents were supposed to carry out their missions.
Cherkasov, for example, passed through Brazil, but also lived in Ireland and the United States, where he lived a few kilometers from the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency. Intelligence (CIA).
In March 2023, BBC News Brasil revealed how Cherkasov had, according to investigations, "heated" Brazilian documents with the help of a notary's employee.
According to documents obtained by BBC News Brasil, Cherkasov allegedly offered a US$400 necklace for the employee to help him. There was no indication, however, that she knew that Cherkasov was a spy for the Russian government.
Over the past few years, the Russian Embassy in Brazil has never responded to requests for response made by BBC News Brasil about the case.
The closest the Russian government came to admitting that someone from this group of nine people was, in fact, a spy was when Mikhail Mikushin was included in a prisoner exchange agreement between Russia and the United States, in August 2024.

Source: G1

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