Ich habe die CIA-Einheit zum Schutz von Überläufern geleitet – hier erfahren Sie, warum sich Spione gegen Russland wenden

His whereabouts remain a mystery. Even his own relatives have no way of contacting him. He reportedly moved to New Zealand, though that could be a bluff. The only thing certain? He must be living under a false identity.

Nearly eight years after surviving an [assassination attempt by Kremlin agents in Salisbury](https://inews.co.uk/news/important-revelations-salisbury-novichok-attack-report-4086106?ico=in-line_link), the Russian defector [Sergei Skripal](https://inews.co.uk/topic/sergei-skripal?srsltid=AfmBOopVcH_zMZDRNsXdZMWDBN1ybLibdNUGasH0Ee-L8rjjWHfkKSwW&ico=in-line_link) is still in hiding – while Moscow’s war against anyone who has betrayed [Vladimir Putin](https://inews.co.uk/topic/vladimir-putin?ico=in-line_link) continues across the globe.

The cases are certainly piling up.

Military helicopter pilot Maksim Kuzminov, who flew to Ukraine in 2023 and urged others to switch sides -leading a Russian spy chief to label him a “moral corpse” – was [shot dead in Spain](https://inews.co.uk/news/world/russian-pilot-spain-killed-ex-2920644?ico=in-line_link) just six months later and no suspect has been identified. Others may have been targeted through Moscow’s abuse of [Interpol’s worldwide arrest warrants](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c20gg729y1yo), a leak revealed last month. 

That’s besides the poisoning of [Alexander Litvinenko](https://inews.co.uk/news/world/alexander-litvinenko-wife-says-russian-agent-wanted-murder-should-confess-2617204?ico=in-line_link) by former KGB agents in 2008. No wonder one former double agent who lives in the UK, Boris Karpichkov, frets that he is a “[dead man walking](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/27/im-a-dead-man-walking-ex-russian-spy-says-defectors-in-uk-are-at-risk)”.

So how do Western security services protect defectors from Kremlin plots? And how do they rescue spies still serving inside Russia if their cover is at risk of being blown?

Someone who knows about the dangers and difficulties is Joe Augustyn. For nearly three years, he ran the CIA’s National Resettlement Operations Centre (NROC), the unit tasked with arranging entirely new lives for foreign intelligence sources who escape to the US, and then shielding them from any threats.