Another Russian Secret Service officer dies by suicide in Moscow

An officer in Russia’s Secret Service, the Federal Protective Service (FSO), died by suicide in Moscow yesterday, RIA Novosti reported on Tuesday, December 22, citing an unnamed source in law enforcement.

According to the source, the lieutenant colonel’s body was found on Tsandera Street on the morning of Monday, December 21. A suicide note was later found at the officer’s home, the source added.

In the note, the officer said that he “took his own life for personal reasons, not related to the service,” an unnamed source in law enforcement told the state news agency TASS. The Russian Investigative Committee’s Moscow branch has launched a pre-investigation probe in response to the officer’s death. 

At the end of November, an FSO officer died by suicide while on duty inside the Kremlin. According to the Telegram-based news outlet Baza, the officer’s name was Mikhail Zakharov; according to colleagues, his suicide could be attributed to “the indifferent attitude of the FSO leadership to his working conditions, as well as frequent overtime.” Sources told Baza that Zakharov committed suicide after being informed that “he was going to be forced to go to work for a ninth day in a row.”