Western diplomats in Moscow describe surveillance and isolation during the war
Five Western diplomats who served in Russia since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine tell the BBC about constant surveillance and restricted contacts. They compare the pressure to the Cold War era.
Western ambassadors in Russia work under constant surveillance and are increasingly cut off from the country they were sent to understand, five US, UK and European diplomats tell the BBC. All served in Moscow after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The war is now in its fifth year, and President Vladimir Putin's government classes Western states as "unfriendly".
Pressure echoing the Cold War
The diplomats compare today's pressure with the Cold War, when embassies were monitored through physical surveillance, listening devices hidden in gifts, and "spy dust" — a near-invisible chemical used to track officials.
After the war began, European countries and the US expelled hundreds of Russian diplomats. Moscow responded in kind, declaring hundreds of Western diplomats persona non grata, which left many embassies short-staffed.
Lynne Tracy, US ambassador in Moscow from 2023 to 2025, calls the post probably the hardest of her career. Her 30-year career included Pakistan, where she survived an armed attack in 2008. Yet in Peshawar, she says, some things were within her control, whereas in Moscow the main difficulty was high uncertainty caused by pressure from Russian counterintelligence.
Intimidation and recruitment attempts
One European diplomat says he was warned before departure to expect listening devices and cameras in every room of his home. Another former ambassador dismissed two Russian employees after the FSB, Russia's domestic security service, tried to recruit them and demanded they report on everything happening at the mission. The pair told the embassy, which let them go, since they could otherwise have faced criminal prosecution.
Russians who would normally build ties with diplomats, such as those in academia and culture, are also being intimidated into avoiding contact. One former ambassador says FSB agents tailed his guests right to the embassy doors.
Russian officials openly accuse diplomats from "unfriendly countries" of espionage. Russian journalist Alexei Venediktov says Moscow has effectively banned most officials from speaking to Western embassies. One former European ambassador says there are no calls or meetings at ministerial level.
Tracy left Moscow in 2025 feeling her main mission was accomplished: the US Embassy had held firm. She is also proud of efforts to maintain links between Americans and ordinary Russians, which she believes can help speed improvement in relations when it becomes possible.
