A top Ukrainian counterintelligence officer has been unmasked as a Russian mole in a sophisticated sting operation that has stunned the intelligence world.
Colonel Dmitry Kozyura, the very man tasked with hunting down spies for Ukraine, was arrested this week on suspicion of working for Moscow after a dramatic security operation that appears to mimic British tactics from the 1940s.
Ukraine’s SBU intelligence service claims Kozyura was recruited by Russia’s FSB in 2018 during a trip to Vienna – and had been secretly passing on information to Vladimir Putin’s spies ever since.
Rather than immediately arrest him, Ukraine’s counterintelligence officers turned the tables on their own chief, letting him operate for months under close surveillance while secretly monitoring his every move.
SBU chief Vasyl Malyuk, who personally led the operation, revealed: ‘We actually lived with him, conducting audio and video monitoring.
‘In the process of all this, we managed to qualitatively document the collection and transmission of relevant information by the traitor to the enemy.’
Using sophisticated cyber tools, investigators were able to hack his phones and computers, install tracking software to record his messages, and even bug his home, car and office.
To further entrap him, intelligence officers fed him false information, known in spy circles as ‘chicken feed’, ensuring that Russia received misleading reports while Ukraine kept tabs on the deception.
Images show Malyuk grabbing Kozyura by the neck, as the suspected traitor stands with his hands cuffed, dressed in a bulky puffer jacket
Colonel Dmitry Kozyura (above) was arrested this week on suspicion of working for Moscow
A later image shows him kneeling, seemingly resigned to his fate, with a large red lump on his forehead, hinting at a struggle
In 1941 a debate raged between the Allies over what to do with enemy spies.
The USA preferred to publicly shame and execute them where as the British devised an altogether more sophisticated approach: capturing spies, putting them under close surveillance, ‘turning’ them if possible, imitating their communication techniques and feeding back quantities of misleading intelligence.
This was called the ‘Double Cross’ system.
Malyuk claims his team gathered evidence of at least 14 separate occasions where Kozyura had passed classified material to the FSB – some real, some deliberately planted.
The sting operation came to a head on Wednesday, when SBU officers swooped in a dramatic, stage-managed arrest, broadcasting footage on social media.
Images show Malyuk grabbing Kozyura by the neck, as the suspected traitor stands with his hands cuffed, dressed in a bulky puffer jacket.
A later image shows him kneeling, seemingly resigned to his fate, with a large red lump on his forehead, hinting at a struggle.
Kozyura’s motives remain unclear, but the SBU claims his parents supported Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and knew their son was working for Russian intelligence.
His arrest came on the very same day that Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin spoke for 90 minutes in a phone call that has raised fears of Ukraine being sidelined in future peace talks.
Head of the SBU Vasyl Malyuk. Malyuk claims his team gathered evidence of at least 14 separate occasions where Kozyura had passed classified material to the FSB
FSB HQ in the centre of Moscow, Russia. The incident is expected to cause chaos inside Russian intelligence, with FSB analysts now scrambling to determine how much of Kozyura’s information was real
His arrest came on the very same day that Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin spoke for 90 minutes in a phone call that has raised fears of Ukraine being sidelined in future peace talks
Experts believe that by exposing Kozyura now, Ukraine is sending a direct warning to the Kremlin (above): ‘We have eyes on you’
Experts believe that by exposing Kozyura now, Ukraine is sending a direct warning to the Kremlin: ‘We have eyes on you.’
The incident is expected to cause chaos inside Russian intelligence, with FSB analysts now scrambling to determine how much of Kozyura’s information was real, how long he had been compromised, and whether they have been fed false intelligence all along.
Kozyura’s exposure raises even bigger questions about whether he was truly working for Moscow or if, at some point, he was turned by Ukraine and forced to feed Russian intelligence misleading information.
Whatever the truth, experts say his case will go down in history as one of the most audacious spy stings of the modern era.
As one Ukrainian official put it: ‘The message is that we are continuing, we’re strong, we’re capable, we’re able, we will deliver.’
