CIA Director John Ratcliffe arrived in Moscow on Tuesday, people familiar with the matter said, for a rare visit as Russia slogs through its fifth year of war in Ukraine.
U.S. officials had not announced Ratcliffe’s trip, but publicly available flight tracking data captured the movement of a U.S. government transport plane from Joint Base Andrews on the outskirts of Washington to the Russian capital.
Spokespeople for the CIA, the Pentagon and the U.S. Air Force declined to comment. The White House did not respond to a request for comment. Those familiar with Ratcliffe’s trip to Russia spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the visit.
It was not immediately clear what the trip’s purpose is and whether any other senior U.S. officials were part of the U.S. delegation.
Ratcliffe’s visit was reported earlier by CBS News.
The last known visit for a CIA director to Moscow was in late 2021, when William J. Burns, who led the agency under President Joe Biden, warned Russian President Vladimir Putin and his top aides not to attack Ukraine and spelled out what the consequences would be. Moscow launched its full-scale invasion within weeks.
Ratcliffe’s visit to Moscow comes as Ukrainian long-range strikes into Russia, including the capital, have targeted energy infrastructure and online retail facilities, unnerving the population. Russia also has stepped up drone and missile strikes on Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, and elsewhere, exploiting shortfalls of air-defense resources.
The U.S. aircraft that arrived in Moscow, a C-17A Globemaster III, is the Defense Department’s workhorse heavy transport plane. The airframe is especially valuable for sensitive diplomatic visits, allowing leaders to bring a tailored suite of specialized vehicles, electronic equipment and support personnel.
The C-17A departed from Joint Base Andrews on Sunday evening, bound for Riga, Latvia, according to tracking data from Flightradar24. The plane appeared to stay in Latvia for a 24-hour layover before departing for Moscow on Tuesday morning, landing shortly after 9 a.m.
A second U.S. Air Force plane, a C-40B, also took off from Joint Base Andrews and landed in Riga several hours after the C-17A’s arrival in the country.
Publicly available flight tracking data does not show the C-40B on the next flight to Moscow. The aircraft is a modified business jet used to transport senior government officials.
A video shared on social media Tuesday and geolocated by The Washington Post shows a motorcade of cars, some with red diplomatic plates, driving east on New Arbat Avenue in central Moscow near a Russian armed forces building. At least one of the license plates says “04,” the United States’ diplomatic license country code in Russia.
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