Former World Chess Champion Kasparov Says US Warned Him About Kremlin Kill Plot

Former world chess ‌champion Garry Kasparov has said the security services from both the United States and ‌Lithuania have warned him that his ⁠life was in danger, after a Russian plot was discovered which allegedly targeted Kremlin critics living abroad.

Last month the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) said five people had been charged with plotting, on behalf of Russian intelligence, to ⁠assassinate two opposition figures.

One of the targets was in the United States, and the other in Lithuania.

DOJ did not identify Kasparov—who moved to the United States from Russia in 2013 and lives in New York—but in a Substack post the 63-year-old former chess grandmaster said he had been warned his life was in danger.

He identified the other person as Ivan Tyutrin, the co-founder of the Free Russia Forum, who is based in Lithuania.

“Neither I nor Ivan have been told explicitly that we were the targets whose names are redacted in the indictment of the assassins,” Kasparov said.

“We were, however, warned by security services in Lithuania and the United States that our lives were in danger and that we should take precautions, which I did and will continue to do.”

The Epoch Times reached out to the Free Russia Forum for comment, but did not receive a response by publication time.

Kasparov—who was born in Baku in what is now Azerbaijan, when it was part of the Soviet Union—became famous when, at the age of 22, he beat Anatoly Karpov to become world chess champion, a title he held until 2000.

Kasparov, an increasingly outspoken critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, chairs the Renew Democracy Initiative, a nonprofit that describes itself as an “intellectual home for the pro-democracy movement” globally.

In his The Next Move Substack, Kasparov said his friend and fellow opposition figure, Boris Nemtsov, was “murdered in cold blood in front of the Kremlin” in February 2015.

‘I Will Not Hide’: Kasparov

“But I will not stop, and I will not hide, even if I thought it was possible to do so. I believe that the best defense is a good offense,” Kasparov said.

“My family and I will not truly be safe as long as Putin is in power in Russia—a circumstance shared by millions.”

The DOJ only referred to the targets of the alleged Russian intelligence plot as Victim-1, who lived in the United States, and Victim-2, who lived in Lithuania.

They said a U.S. national had been offered $40,000 to “eliminate” or “disappear” Victim-1.

A U.S. citizen was also contacted about surveilling and murdering Victim-2, who was allegedly described by the plotters as a “bad guy” who was “telling lies about Russia.”

The Kremlin said last month it saw no reason to comment on the U.S. allegations, saying there was an absence of credible evidence and facts.

Russia has ⁠previously denied conducting such plots on foreign soil.

Reuters contributed to this report.