On Wednesday, November 9, it became known that on November 8, at the age of 72, Colonel-General Viktor Cherkesov was the former head of the investigative service of the Leningrad KGB department, who later became the first head of the Russian Federal Drug Control Service.
Viktor Cherkesov was born on July 13, 1950 in Leningrad. Graduated from the Faculty of Law of Leningrad State University. He worked in the prosecutor’s office and in the department of the KGB of the USSR in Leningrad. Investigated cases of corruption, espionage, anti-Soviet activities, smuggling.
From 1992 to 1998 – Head of the FSB of the Russian Federation for St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region, member of the board of the FSB of Russia.
In 1998-2000 – First Deputy Director of the FSB of Russia Vladimir Putin.
In 2000-2003, he was the plenipotentiary representative of Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Northwestern Federal District.
From 2003 to 2008 – Director of the Federal Drug Control Service of the Russian Federation. At the same time, in 2007-2008, he was Chairman of the State Anti-Drug Committee of the Russian Federation.
In May 2008, he was appointed head of the Federal Agency for the Supply of Arms, Military, Special Equipment and Materiel of the Russian Federation. In June 2010, he was relieved of his post.
In 2011, he was elected to the State Duma of the sixth convocation, served as First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Security and Anti-Corruption.
Viktor Cherkesov had the rank of colonel-general of the reserve and retired police general.
Publisher and journalist Dmitry Volchek reacted to the news of Cherkesov’s death in the following way: “General Viktor Cherkesov, whom I remember in the role of a KGB investigator who destroyed the Leningrad cultural underground, died. On his initiative, philologist Mikhail Meilakh and publisher Slava Dolinin were arrested. He organized searches at feminists and oversaw the last case in the USSR about anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda, one of the defendants in which was Anna Ermolaeva, now a famous Austrian artist. strange, Putin also understood this, throwing him into a dump of honor after a pretentious article about a Chekist hook … I wouldn’t be surprised if they poisoned him too, now is just the time when they should poison each other, like Magda Goebbels their children.
“Novaya Gazeta. Europe” recalls that under Cherkesov, a series of high-profile arrests took place in the drug control of Russia. Several employees of the State Drug Control Service – General Alexander Bulbov, his secretary Maria Kovaleva and the former deputy head of the FSKN’s own security department Yuri Geval – as well as employees of other law enforcement agencies were suspected of illegally wiretapping the phones of six businessmen and the host of the Moment of Truth program Andrei Karaulov. Cherkesov called this case “civil strife within the so-called KGB community.” “Falling into the abyss, the post-Soviet society clung to this very “Chekist hook.” And hung on it. But someone wanted it to hit the bottom and shatter. talking about the bad properties of the “Chekist” hook, on which the society was held,” he wrote for Kommersant.