Brazil authorizes expulsion of accused Russian spy

Brazil has authorized the expulsion of Sergey Vladimirovich Cherkasov, a Russian national accused by the United States of espionage, according to a government decision published July 6.

The decision did not say which country the 40-year-old would be expelled to. Cherkasov has been imprisoned in Brazil since 2022 and is wanted for extradition by both Washington, on espionage charges, and Moscow, on drug-trafficking allegations.

Cherkasov was arrested in the Netherlands in 2022 while posing as a Brazilian master's student. Dutch police said he was an agent of Russia's GRU military intelligence and was seeking to infiltrate the International Criminal Court in The Hague to influence cases related to war crimes in Ukraine.

He was sent to Brazil, where he was sentenced to 15 years in prison for identity fraud. US authorities accused him in 2023 of acting as an agent of a foreign power while studying at Johns Hopkins University in Washington from 2018 to 2020, and said he collected information about US citizens for Russian superiors.