Russia places UK ex-Defence Minister Ben Wallace on wanted list

Russia ‌has placed British former Defence Minister Ben Wallace ⁠on a ⁠wanted list in connection with an unspecified criminal investigation, according to the Russian ⁠Interior Ministry’s database cited by state media.

State-run news agency TASS quoted an unnamed source in law enforcement as saying that the investigation was linked to “terrorism-related charges”.

Wallace served as the UK’s defence minister from 2019 – before Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in ⁠2022 – until August 2023. He has continued to advocate boosting military support for Kyiv and condemned Russian aggression.

In October last year, a regional Russian lawmaker called for Wallace to be put on Russia’s wanted list over comments he made the previous month at the Warsaw Security Forum about Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.

On that occasion, Wallace recommended helping Ukraine carry out a military strike on the bridge linking southern Russia to Crimea.

“We have to help Ukraine have ⁠the long-range capabilities to make Crimea unviable. We need to choke the ⁠life out of Crimea. And if we ⁠do that, I think [Russian President Vladimir] Putin will realise he’s got something to lose,” he said. “We need to smash the cursed bridge.”

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov at the time described Wallace’s remarks as “stupid”, stressing that Moscow does not consider it necessary to comment on statements by former Western officials.

Numerous individuals and groups inside and outside Russia have been prosecuted as the Kremlin has cracked down on dissent concerning its narrative of the war in Ukraine.

In 2024, Putin signed a law allowing authorities to confiscate the assets of people convicted of spreading “deliberately false information” about the military. It covers offences such as “justifying terrorism” and spreading “fake news” about the military, and has been used extensively to silence Putin’s critics.

Last year, Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) opened a criminal case against exiled oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, accusing him of creating a “terrorist organisation” and plotting to violently seize power.

The FSB said the charges related to the activities of a Khodorkovsky-backed group that opposes the war in Ukraine. Khodorkovsky said Russia was a “fully fledged totalitarian dictatorship” and promised to “fight for a Russia governed by the rule of law and political pluralism”.

Moscow issued an arrest warrant for the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor Karim Khan in 2023 after he issued a warrant for Putin’s arrest on war crimes charges.

It is not ‌clear how many foreign officials or public figures are on the Russian Interior Ministry’s database of wanted persons. ‌Independent news outlet Mediazona reported that the list includes dozens of European politicians and officials.