Marina Kalashnikova

Marina Kalashnikova (died 3 August 2013) was a Russian historian and freelance journalist. In 2010 she and her ex-KGB agent husband Viktor Kalashnikov were treated in hospital in Germany for mercury poisoning in what they have said was an attempt on their life by Russia's FSB, the successor to the KGB. The case has been compared to the alleged poisoning and murder of Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko.

Personal life She was married to Viktor Kalashnikov, a former KGB colonel and journalist.

Activities Kalashnikova and her husband had been publishing articles critical of the Russian Government since the 1990s. They left Russia and have lived in various countries, such as Ukraine, Poland, Estonia and now Germany.

Views Kalashnikova considers Russia to be ruled in an anti-democratic way: "It is clear that the [Kremlin] regime has no restraint and will commit any crime, break any rule, surpass any benchmark in order to consolidate its already illegitimate power". She has also criticised Western analysts for thinking that conflict with Russia can be avoided. In August 2009 she stated, "The West does not care to wake from the dream of its wishful thinking, even when Moscow turns to [...] reanimating Joseph Stalin’s cult of personality together with the ideology of the Cheka."