Opinion | Putin Is Hunting Down Ordinary People

In November 2022, my editors asked me to be careful about what I ate and stop ordering takeout.Initially, I didn’t think much of it.

But I soon realized the importance of their advice when, just one month later, my colleague Elena Kostyuchenko discovered she had been poisoned in Germany, in a probable assassination attempt by the Russian state.Such stories have become routine.Last year, an investigative journalist, Alesya Marokhovskaya, was harassed in the Czech Republic; in February, the bullet-riddled body of a Russian defector, Maxim Kuzminov, was found in Spain.

In both cases, the Kremlin was assumed to be involved.Russian opposition figures know well that even in exile they remain targets of Russia’s intelligence services.But it’s not just them who are in danger.

There are also the hundreds of thousands of Russians who left home because they did not want to have anything to do with Vladimir Putin’s war — or were forced out, accused of not embracing it enough.These low-profile dissenters are subjected to surveillance and kidnappings, too.

Yet their repression happens in silence — away from the spotlight and often with the tacit consent, or inadequate prevention, of the countries to which they have fled.It’s a terrifying thing: The Kremlin is hunting down ordinary people across the world, and nobody seems to care.I’ve been gathering information about Russia’s targeting of exiles since the start of the war in Ukraine.My sources range from people who themselves survived abductions and surveillance to the leaders of Russian diasporas around the world — and the few human rights activists helping them.

Many spoke to me on the condition of anonymity in order to discuss Russian repression without fear of reprisal.The Kremlin, of course, denies any involvement — mostly saying that it cannot comment on what is happening to people in other countries.

But the evidence is piling up.There’s a vocal coach arrested in Kazakhstan at Moscow’s reque...