They Fleed Russia, but the West Sent Them Back
BBC News
Image source: Getty Images
Image caption: Criticising the government, whether on the street or on social media, can result in a prison sentence in Russia (file pic)
By Will Vernon
Published 17 minutes ago
Russian security services were waiting when the flight landed in Moscow in December. On board were Russians the US had deported, including activists denied political asylum.
"It was unbelievably frightening. My knees were shaking with fear," says Katya, one of the deportees. (We have changed her name to protect her identity, as she remains in Russia.)
Katya had left Russia and claimed asylum in the US two years earlier. When Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, many countries publicly welcomed fleeing Russians. However, more than four years later, attitudes have hardened. The numbers of anti-war Russians forcibly returned from Western countries is rising, and Katya's experience highlights the potential risks they face.
US authorities rejected her application for asylum, after she said she had provided evidence that she had taken part in protests and was a member of an opposition movement.
In Moscow, Katya says officers from the FSB security service handed all the male deportees military papers, requiring them to register with the local enlistment office, from where men are often sent to the war in Ukraine. Another passenger on the flight and an activist confirmed her account.
The officers interrogated her, and many others, for several hours.
"At one point, they found incriminating information on my phone," says Katya. "Their faces changed in a second. I was very afraid that they would simply bundle me off somewhere."
Katya was eventually released and allowed to stay with relatives. But she says police continue to call her and visit her at home.
"I feel as if I'm in a cage, like in a zoo," she says, "Whenever I see a police car, I feel terrified and start thinking, 'What if they're coming for me?'"
Katya showed the BBC documents and photographs confirming her story, which matches accounts from other deportees.
Removals from the US rose from 222 in 2023 to more than 1,200 in 2025, amid a wider increase in deportations under President Donald Trump's second term. Activists say Russian deportees included dissidents and Russian army deserters, some of whom were imprisoned or sent to war after returning to Russia.
One such case is Leonid Melekhin, an anti-war activist who sought asylum in the US after being arrested at protests in Russia. He had posted photographs of Russian President Vladimir Putin online with the message "Putin: murderer, fascist, usurper". After being deported back home last year, Melekhin was charged with "justifying terrorism" and sentenced to six years in prison.
"We have several examples of people who got eight years in prison when they crossed the [Russian] border," says Andrei Pivovarov, from Russia's exiled opposition Anti-War Committee.
And deportations are taking place from Europe too. His organisation has changed its advice to dissidents escaping Russia: the EU is no longer safe, it is better to seek refuge elsewhere.
Germany has sent back several Russian dissidents, including journalist Artyom Korotkov, who was arrested for "spreading false information" about the war in Ukraine.