The leadership of the FSB did not extend the contract with the head of the technical service of the Operational Search Directorate of the FSB (OPU), Colonel Alexei Ksenofontov. This became known to The Insider.
The OPU of the FSB is a secret unit, its employees conduct round-the-clock surveillance of diplomatic missions, residences of ambassadors, diplomats and hotels where foreigners stay. Ksenofontov headed the technical service of the OPU, his tasks included the installation of hidden video cameras and listening devices at the facilities.
According to preliminary information, Ksenofontov's resignation is connected with the decommercialization of the FSB. Employees of the "outdoor" FSB carry out the orders of wealthy businessmen: they follow their competitors, wives and mistresses. As Dossier pointed out , prices reach up to $10,000 per day, and a mobile telephone tower disguised as a Gazelle "Glazing of balconies and loggias" can be rented through the OPU for $100,000 per month.
Ksenofontov was replaced by Colonel Andrei Urgapov, the protégé of the head of all surveillance services (military unit 52295), General Gennady Shvetov, who, in turn, is in the inner circle of the Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation, Nikolai Patrushev. The identity of Colonel Urgapov is strictly classified, and his real place of residence is not indicated in the address base of Moscow. In 2006, he was going to take out a loan, and when asked by a bank employee to give his work phone number, he replied: “I have no right to disclose.”
The Insider's source in the central office of the FSB said that an inspection of the special garage of the FSB security guard is now underway. The inspectors are especially interested in where the decommissioned cars went and how the tender for the purchase of new ones went.
Over the past three years, this is the second dismissal from military unit 96586. Before Ksenofontov, this position was occupied by Colonel Vladimir Petrovsky. He was fired on May 24, 2019.