Putin Marks Christmas at a Church on a Military Base, Surrounded by GRU Officers

На русском

Vladimir Putin marked Christmas with members of the military for the third time, but unlike the previous two years the Kremlin did not name the church where the president attended the holiday service. According to an analysis by Agenstvo, the church is located on the grounds of a GRU (Russia’s military intelligence agency) military unit in the Moscow region. Standing closest to the president was the unit’s commander, Alexei Galkin (Алексей Галкин), who received Russia’s top state honor, Hero of Russia, during the Second Chechen War. Another new element this year was a brief address Putin delivered inside the church immediately after the service.

Details. In a Kremlin statement, Putin attended a Christmas service at one of the churches dedicated to St. George the Victorious in the Moscow region. In the past, the Kremlin has specified which churches Putin visited. Last year, for example, he attended the Church of St. George on Poklonnaya Hill; in 2024, a church at his Novo-Ogaryovo residence; and in 2023, the Annunciation Cathedral in the Moscow Kremlin.

• ️The Kremlin did not explain why it did not identify the church where the president was. Kremlin press-pool reporter Alexander Yunashev said ahead of the Christmas service that Putin would spend the holiday among participants in what Russia calls the «special military operation,» and that covering the event would be difficult because some of those present «can’t be shown on camera.»

• ️According to Agenstvo’s analysis, the president marked Christmas at the Church of the Great Martyr George the Victorious on the grounds of the Senezh Special-Purpose Center (Military Unit 92154) in Solnechnogorsk. According to the Azbuka palomnika project, the idea of building a church there was approved in 2017 by Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, and the appeal was backed by Major General Alexei Galkin, commander of Unit 92154, and Alexander Matovnikov, commander of Russia’s Special Operations Forces.

• ️Galkin, who stood next to Putin during the service, was born in the Ukrainian city of Cherkasy in 1970. During the First Chechen War he was taken captive by insurgents. He later became the prototype for the protagonist of the 2004 film Personal Number, financed in part with money from Sibneft (Galkin was played by actor Alexei Makarov). Galkin received the Hero of Russia Gold Star in 2002, when he was a major serving in a GRU reconnaissance group. In the autumn of 2002, his group, according to the Heroes of the Country project, captured documents said to indicate links between international terrorist networks and the Chechen war. He handed the documents to Putin and was awarded the honor.

• ️Unit 92154 was mentioned in the news only recently: an officer from the unit, Yuri Sizov, was described as the handler of a Ukrainian national accused of organizing explosions on a railway line in Poland. The elite Senezh special-operations center—part of the GRU’s Department of Special Tasks—has carried out sabotage operations in the West, The Wall Street Journal reported in February. Western intelligence agencies consider the unit responsible for parcel explosions at DHL facilities in Europe and for planning an assassination attempt against Rheinmetall’s chief executive.

• ️Another participant in the Christmas service was likely Andrei Popov (Андрей Попов). Based on leaked data, he is also a serviceman of Unit 92154, a colonel, and a Hero of Russia.

• ️The third was Konstantin Maslyanko (Константин Маслянко), a colonel and Hero of Russia. According to leaks, in 2017 he worked in Military Unit 45807 (also part of the GRU). Ukraine’s SBU security service has described him as a man who planned a terrorist attack in central Kyiv in 2014 and organized a bombing at a Ukrainian checkpoint near Luhansk in 2015. The Ukrainian outlet ZMINA.info reported that Maslyanko operated under the command of Russian Special Operations Forces commander Valery Flyustikov and Putin’s former bodyguard Alexei Dyumin.
• ️Footage also shows a woman in military uniform. Her head is uncovered.
• ️After the service, Putin addressed those present with a brief speech: «And very often we call the Lord the Savior, because He came to Earth to save all people. And so Russia’s warriors—Russia’s warriors—always, as it were, by the Lord’s will, fulfill this mission: defending the Fatherland and its people, saving the Motherland and its people.»

This is an AI-generated English translation

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