Maksim Kuzminov flew a Russian miltary helicopter to Ukraine. Armed with a new identity, he moved to a Spanish resort. Then he was killed in an underground car park
In some ways it is easy to see why Maksim Kuzminov chose to start a new life in Villajoyosa on the Costa Blanca. It overlooks the Mediterranean, with spectacular sunrises. Lemons and oranges droop from trees, brightly coloured homes dot the shore and Villajoyosa is famous for its chocolate. The name means Joyful Town.
More importantly, Kuzminov must have calculated he could blend into the Russian and Ukrainian communities that fill this corner of Spain with Slavic languages, food and faces. With a new identity – a passport claimed he was Igor Shevchenko – here was a place to hide in plain sight, safe from the vengeance of Vladimir Putin.
The fugitive Russian pilot was discreet. He lived in an apartment block ringed by other apartment blocks, learned some Spanish, breakfasted on coffee, toast and ham alone at a nearby cafe and mostly steered clear of fellow Russians. He avoided the supermarket with eastern European pastries and 52 brands of vodka. It might have been lonely, but it was, at least, life.
The fantasy of escape ended on 13 February when gunmen shot the 28-year-old six times in his apartment complex’s underground car park. The reported use of Russian bullets and the undisguised glee in Moscow reinforced the point: you cannot defect to Ukraine with an army helicopter, deliver a propaganda coup to the Kremlin’s enemies, pocket a payment equivalent to $500,000, leave the relative sanctuary of Kyiv and expect to survive.
It is very unwise to move to a place with a lot of Russians who might recognise him and report him to Russia, especially a tourist town with a lot of people coming and going. Also, with this kind of money they gave him, he could have gotten plastic surgery to make him harder to recognise.
When he invited his former girlfriend to visit, he must not have considered that even if she is loyal to him, Russian state security could easily monitor her communications and movements.
He needed to live a quiet life, but it seems he wanted a full life.
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This is the best summary I could come up with:
The reported use of Russian bullets and the undisguised glee in Moscow reinforced the point: you cannot defect to Ukraine with an army helicopter, deliver a propaganda coup to the Kremlin’s enemies, pocket a payment equivalent to $500,000, leave the relative sanctuary of Kyiv and expect to survive.
“Chronicle of an execution foretold,” said the Spanish newspaper El Periódico, paraphrasing Gabriel García Márquez’s novella, and it was hard to dispute the sense of inevitability.
Such was the shock and anxiety, few residents of the apartment block in Villajoyosa wished to give their names or in some cases even acknowledge the nature of what happened.
Military intelligence officers who coordinated his defection say he initially agreed to join the Freedom of Russia Legion, a group of Russian volunteers fighting with Ukraine.
He added that Kuzminov had not read the works of Viktor Suvorov, a Russian defector turned writer, who laid bare the brutal methods of Moscow military intelligence.
“This traitor and criminal became a moral corpse at the very moment when he planned his dirty and terrible crime,” said Sergei Naryshkin, the chief of Russia’s SVR foreign intelligence service.
The original article contains 1,126 words, the summary contains 188 words. Saved 83%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
