Former Pussy Riot Member Reveals Coercion into Russian Spy Work, Failed Assassination Plot

Former Pussy Riot member Rita Flores has revealed that she was coerced into working as an informant for Russia’s FSB security service, saying that she gathered information on anti-war activists and was involved in a failed assassination plot against an exiled Kremlin critic. Flores said FSB officers coerced her into signing a cooperation agreement following a February 2023 raid on her Moscow apartment, threatening her with criminal prosecution over social media posts about alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine alongside death threats against her relatives. “They began recruiting me with all kinds of threats and abuse [including] threats to murder my family and that I’d never be able to prove who killed my mother,” she told the exiled news outlet Port in a video interview. Operating under the codename “Harley,” Flores said she was assigned to build detailed profiles on Russian artists and political dissidents. Between early 2024 and June, she received monthly payments of 50,000 rubles ($600) from her security service handlers after an initial disbursement of 30,000 rubles ($360). Flores detailed how she deliberately sabotaged her FSB assignments for over two years, faking personal feuds with targets like artists Philippenzo and Pavel Krisevich to delay their arrest by law enforcement authorities. In mid-2025, Flores said she was ordered to lure her ex-boyfriend and former Pussy Riot member Pyotr Verzilov into a cafe in Serbia where undercover FSB agents planned to kidnap and kill him. The activist said she was offered 3 million rubles ($36,000) for her role in that assassination plot. “That was the point of no return. Before, I thought I just needed to wait to get my passport back and flee. But then I realized how far they were willing to go,” Flores said in the interview with Port. Refusing to help carry out the assassination plot against Verzilov, Flores stalled her handlers and sought help from human rights lawyer Dmitry Zakhvatov. Exiled businessman Leonid Nevzlin subsequently helped her flee Russia earlier this month. The Moscow Times could not independently verify any of the claims made by Flores.