The Insider reveals new details of Russian intelligence scheme offering Taliban $200,000 bounties for killing U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan
In a new investigation based on reporting with Der Spiegel, The Insider has revealed details of alleged collaboration between Russia’s military intelligence agency, the GRU, and the Taliban. According to the report, between 2016 and 2019, Moscow paid Taliban-linked fighters around $200,000 for each Western coalition soldier they killed in Afghanistan. Meduza summarizes the key findings from the The Insider’s report.
Back in 2020, The New York Times reported that Russian intelligence had offered bounties to militants for killing U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan. According to the report, U.S. intelligence found that a Russian unit known for covert operations in Europe — including assassination attempts — was behind the payments. American officials also reportedly intercepted evidence of bank transfers from a GRU-controlled account to one linked to the Taliban, corroborating information from Afghan businessmen arrested on suspicion of acting as intermediaries.
The Insider spoke to four former Afghan officials, three of whom held senior positions in the National Directorate of Security (NDS), the country’s intelligence agency before the Taliban took power in 2021. According to them, the attacks allegedly funded by Moscow occurred between 2016 and 2019.
The NDS uncovered the scheme in mid-2019 while interrogating captured Taliban fighters. This led to the arrest of at least ten people in the Kabul, Kunduz, and Logar provinces, who were allegedly working as GRU couriers under the direction of Rahmatullah Azizi. A former smuggler, Azizi officially ran a gemstone trading business in Afghanistan. Payments for killing U.S. or coalition soldiers were said to average $200,000 each. A former NDS official estimated that the GRU paid the Taliban at least $30 million overall, with significant amounts also going to other groups opposing Afghanistan’s then-government.
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According to The Insider, GRU Unit 29155 recruited Azizi and his family members by 2015 at the latest. The NDS believes Azizi organized the scheme to funnel payments to fighters. The Insider reports that Azizi has been living full-time in Moscow since 2019, having managed to flee Afghanistan before the operation was exposed. When crossing borders, he used a passport from the same series as other GRU operatives and shared a travel booking with members of Unit 29155. In 2015, he was issued a Russian passport under the name “Rakhim Akhmadov,” with a number that differs by only two digits from that of “Ruslan Boshirov,” a cover name used by Anatoly Chepiga, one of the suspects in the 2018 Salisbury poisonings. In 2017, Azizi set up a diamond trading company, ARIGS Ltd, in Russia, while his father launched a similar business in Kabul. ARIGS stopped operating in 2020 and was dissolved in 2022. Its registered address was near the GRU headquarters in Moscow.
The Insider’s investigation also implicates Par Han Gul Zafar, another Afghan national reportedly recruited by GRU Unit 29155 who worked under the supervision of GRU operative Alexey Arkhipov (Zafar’s documents appear in Arkhipov’s emails and his name is listed on Arkhipov’s car insurance). Zafar was issued two Russian passports: one from a batch made for GRU employees and another under the name “Zafar Davletshin.”
While living in Moscow, Zafar reportedly recruited a group of Afghans who traveled as couriers to Afghanistan and neighboring countries. Some of these individuals later made their way to Western Europe, posing as refugees fleeing the Taliban. Der Spiegel reports that at least two of them sought asylum in Germany shortly after visiting Russia. Although their applications were denied, they reportedly remain in Germany.
According to The Insider, the head of the program was Lieutenant General Ivan Kasianenko, Unit 29155's deputy commander. Kasianenko, who worked as a military attaché in Tehran starting in 2008, was transferred to Kabul by 2015. Border records show he frequently traveled between Moscow and Kabul from 2014 to 2020. The Insider determined that Colonel Alexey Arkhipov acted as the GRU’s main liaison with the Taliban, based on his emails and call logs.
Another figure named in the investigation is Artem Rubtsov, an operative from Unit 29155. In 2018, Rubtsov reportedly enrolled in a gem evaluation course at Moscow State University’s gemology institute under a fake name, listing ARIGS as his employer. Travel records indicate he flew to Kabul on shared bookings with several members of Azizi’s group.
According to one former NDS official, interference from Afghan government officials hampered attempts to investigate the GRU’s funding scheme for the Taliban. Furthermore, the U.S. government’s refusal to publicly acknowledge the existence of the bounty program discouraged the NDS from allocating more resources to the matter, the official said.