K-19: The Widowmaker is a 2002 historical submarine film directed and produced by Kathryn Bigelow, and produced by Edward S. Feldman, Sigurjon Sighvatsson, Christine Whitaker and Matthias Deyle with screenplay by Christopher Kyle. An international co-production of the United States, United Kingdom, Germany and Canada, the film takes place in 1961 and focuses its story on the Soviet Hotel-class submarine K-19.
The Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation is the principal security agency of Russia and the main successor agency to the Soviet Union's KGB; its immediate predecessor was the Federal Counterintelligence Service (FSK) which was reorganized into the FSB in 1995. The three major structural successor components of the former KGB that remain administratively independent of the FSB are the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), the Federal Protective Service (FSO), and the Main Directorate of Special Programs of the President of the Russian Federation (GUSP).
Spooks is a British television spy drama series that originally aired on BBC One from 13 May 2002 to 23 October 2011, consisting of 10 seasons. The title is a colloquialism for spies, and the series follows the activities of the intelligence officers of Section D in MI5, based at the service's Thames House headquarters, in a highly secure suite of offices known as The Grid. In the United States, the show is broadcast under the title MI-5. In Canada, the programme originally aired as MI-5, but later aired on BBC Canada as Spooks.
In September 1999, a series of explosions hit four apartment blocks in the Russian cities of Buynaksk, Moscow, and Volgodonsk, killing more than 300, injuring more than 1,000, and spreading a wave of fear across the country. The bombings, together with the Invasion of Dagestan, triggered the Second Chechen War. The handling of the crisis by Vladimir Putin, who was prime minister at the time, boosted his popularity greatly and helped him attain the presidency within a few months.
Spetsgruppa "A", also known as Alpha Group, or Alfa, whose official name is Directorate "A" of the FSB Special Purpose Center, is a stand-alone sub-unit of Russia's special forces within the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB). It was created by the Soviet KGB in 1974. Although little is known about the exact nature of its primary directives, it is speculated that the unit is authorised to act under the direct control and sanction of Russia's top political leadership, similar to its sister unit, the Directorate "V" (Vympel), which is officially tasked with protecting Russia's strategic installations, as well as conducting black operations inside and outside Russia. It is also available for extended police duties, for paramilitary operations, and for covert operations, both domestically and internationally.
The Beslan school siege was an Islamic terrorist attack that started on 1 September 2004. It lasted three days, and involved the imprisonment of more than 1,100 people as hostages, ending with the deaths of 334 people, 186 of them children, as well as 31 of the attackers. It is considered the deadliest school shooting in history.
The Budyonnovsk hospital hostage crisis took place from 14 to 19 June 1995, when a group of Chechen separatists led by Shamil Basayev attacked the southern Russian city of Budyonnovsk, near the breakaway Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, during the First Chechen War of 1994—1996. After brief fighting in the city, Basayev and his men took over a local hospital complex where they gathered over 2,000 mostly civilian hostages, demanding a ceasefire in Chechnya and Russia to resume talks with the Chechen leadership. Following Russian government's failed attempts to respond to the situation by force, Russian prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin personally agreed to Basayev's demands, securing the release of the hostages.
Nikolai Platonovich Patrushev is a Russian politician, security officer and former intelligence officer who served as the secretary of the Security Council of Russia from 2008 to 2024. He previously served as the director of the Federal Security Service (FSB) from 1999 to 2008. Belonging to the siloviki faction of president Vladimir Putin's inner circle, Patrushev is believed to be one of the closest advisors to Putin and a leading figure behind Russia's national security affairs. He played a key role in the decisions to seize and then annex Crimea in 2014 and to invade Ukraine in 2022.
Galina Vasilyevna Starovoitova was a Soviet dissident, Russian politician and ethnographer known for her work to protect ethnic minorities and promote democratic reforms in Russia. She was shot to death in her apartment building in 1998.
Icon is a thriller novel by British author Frederick Forsyth. Its plot centres on the politics of the Russian Federation in 1999, with an extremist party close to seizing power. Published by Bantam Press in September 1997, (ISBN 978-0-553-57460-9), Icon became a New York Times Bestseller and was adapted into a television film.
Alexander Valterovich Litvinenko was a British-naturalised Russian defector and former officer of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) who specialised in tackling organised crime. A prominent critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, he advised British intelligence and coined the term "mafia state".
The Kizlyar–Pervomayskoye hostage crisis, also known in Russia as the terrorist act in Kizlyar, occurred in January 1996 during the First Chechen War. What began as a raid by Chechen separatist forces led by Salman Raduyev against a federal military airbase near Kizlyar, Dagestan, became a hostage crisis involving thousands of civilians, most of whom were quickly released. It culminated in a battle between the Chechens and Russian special forces in the village of Pervomayskoye, which was destroyed by Russian artillery fire. Although the Chechens escaped from the siege with some of their hostages, at least 26 hostages and more than 200 combatants on both sides died. One third of the homes in Pervomayskoye were destroyed.
Sergei Nikolayevich Yushenkov was a liberal Russian politician. He was assassinated on 17 April 2003, just hours after registering his political party to participate in the December 2003 parliamentary elections.
Alexander Litvinenko was an officer of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) and its predecessor, the KGB, until he left the service and fled the country in autumn 2000.
The Uncharted series, created by video game developer Naughty Dog, features many characters. The series includes the video games Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception, Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, Uncharted: Golden Abyss, and Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, as well as a motion comic prequel, Uncharted: Eye of Indra. It primarily focuses on the exploits of treasure hunter Nathan Drake and his associates as they hunt down various mystical artifacts.
