MOSCOW — According to a report by the Russian outlet The Insider, Samvel Karapetyan’s foreign passport file, issued in Kaluga in 1999, listed his place of work as the FSB Information Center.
The FSB, Russia’s Federal Security Service, is the country’s main domestic security agency and the principal successor to the Soviet-era KGB. It is responsible for counterintelligence, internal security, counterterrorism, border control, and surveillance inside Russia.
The Insider wrote that, according to leaked data, Karapetyan’s passport file contained a note by the Interior Ministry in the “place of work” field stating: “Federal Security Service Information Center.” The outlet said such a note means that, if the citizen is checked, the FSB must first be contacted.
An Interior Ministry employee told the outlet that such designations are usually used for secret agents or foreigners working under FSB supervision.
On May 19, responding to a journalist’s question outside a courthouse, Karapetyan said the report was “the work of Nikol Pashinyan.”
“Only Nikol Pashinyan has ties with the FSB,” Karapetyan said, adding that he was not familiar with the publication and urging the journalist to interpret it independently. Karapetyan also emphasized that he received his Russian passport in 1993–1994.
