The Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB) (Russian: ФСБ, Федеральная служба безопасности Российской Федерации; Federal'naya sluzhba bezopasnosti Rossiyskoy Federatsii) is the main domestic security agency of the Russian Federation and the main successor agency of the Soviet Committee of State Security (KGB). Its main responsibilities are counter-intelligence, internal and border security, counter-terrorism, and surveillance. Its headquarters are on Lubyanka Square, downtown Moscow.
The direct predecessor of the FSB was the Federal Counterintelligence Service (FSK). On 12 April 1995, President Boris Yeltsin signed a law ordering a reorganisation of the FSK, which resulted in the creation of the FSB. In 2003, the FSB's responsibilities were widened with the integration of the Border Guard Service and a major part of the abolished Federal Agency of Government Communication and Information (FAPSI). The FSB was made subordinate to the Ministry of Justice by presidential decree on 9 March 2004. The Director of FSB, since 2008, is Aleksandr Bortnikov.
According to the federal law, the FSB is considered a military service just like the Armed Forces, MVD Internal Troops, FSO, SVR, FSKN and EMERCOM's civil defence.
Read more about Federal Security Service Of The Russian Federation: Overview, Organization, Criticism
Famous quotes containing the words federal, security, service, russian and/or federation:
“I am willing to pledge myself that if the time should ever come that the voluntary agencies of the country together with the local and state governments are unable to find resources with which to prevent hunger and suffering ... I will ask the aid of every resource of the Federal Government.... I have the faith in the American people that such a day will not come.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)
“A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
—Second Amendment, U.S. Constitution (1791)
“The service a man renders his friend is trivial and selfish, compared with the service he knows his friend stood in readiness to yield him, alike before he had begun to serve his friend, and now also. Compared with that good-will I bear my friend, the benefit it is in my power to render him seems small.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“What man dare, I dare.
Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear,
The armed rhinoceros, or the Hyrcan tiger;
Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves
Shall never tremble. Or be alive again
And dare me to the desert with thy sword.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Women realize that we are living in an ungoverned world. At heart we are all pacifists. We should love to talk it over with the war-makers, but they would not understand. Words are so inadequate, and we realize that the hatred must kill itself; so we give our men gladly, unselfishly, proudly, patriotically, since the world chooses to settle its disputes in the old barbarous way.”
—General Federation Of Women’s Clubs (GFWC)