Russian Nuclear Energy Researchers In Europe Endanger Western Security

As international tensions grow, scientific developments become more crucial than ever to creating war-winning technologies. There is a reason the Manhattan Project was kept under strict security measures – and even then, there were leaks.

Beginning in the 1940s, Stalin’s USSR used intelligence to steal America’s atomic secrets and develop nuclear weapons. Throughout the Cold War, the Soviets ran a massive spying operation to gain access to submarine, computer, and space tech. In preparation for its 2022 invasion of Ukraine and as the conflict continued, Russia ramped up its intelligence gathering and influence activities around the world. Recently, concerns have once again been raised that Moscow has had an unobstructed path to obtaining information about cutting-edge nuclear technology from the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN).

Russian Nuclear Scientists Remain at CERN Through JINR

CERN expelled Russia after it launched its invasion. However, it still allowed Russian scientists to participate by continuing to cooperate with the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR). This decision was controversial at the time and still continues to be. JINR is ostensibly an international institution based in Dubna, Russia, some 130 km north of Moscow, and reports continue to circulate, indicating that it is practically in the pocket of the Russian military.

In an official declaration signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin on November 19, 2024, Russia broadened its nuclear doctrine, lowering the threshold for deployment of atomic weapons in the event of an attack on Russia by a nonnuclear actor backed by a nuclear power. Thus, those concerned that JINR scientists are still posted at CERN represent an avoidable security risk consider the situation even more pressing. They contend that by continuing to allow Russian participation, CERN opens the door for Moscow to remain aware of nuclear scientific advancements and utilize this information for military use to the detriment of European and global security.

JINR’s connection to Russia’s war machine has been reported on previously. The institute’s representatives sent to CERN have connections to some 77 Russian entities sanctioned for their support of the war in Ukraine and ties to weapons development, such as the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, which develops drones and fighter aircraft equipment. JINR is listed in the OpenSanctions database as a “sanctions-linked entity” further demonstrating the risk of international technological developments being leveraged by Russia.

Professor Boris Grynyov, Ukraine’s representative to CERN, was able to further outline JINR’s relationship with the Russian defense sector in an exclusive interview with Forbes:
Between 2010 and 2024, JINR directly collaborated with enterprises actively involved in defense industry production: manufacturers of military UAVs, microelectronics, missile weaponry, and components for such systems. Among JINR’s partners were state enterprises, such as MKB Raduga and VNIIA, and private defense contractors, including subsidiaries of the AFK Sistema group.

Grynyov also noted:

JINR has multiple joint ventures with FSB and even operates its trade union office out of an FSB building in Dubna. Furthermore, JINR’s security staff are FSB officers. Scientists from JINR who participate in the FSB ventures are also members of large international collaborations, granting them unrestricted access to scientific institutions worldwide. JINR also claims participation in experiments at two major US laboratories: Fermilab near Chicago and Brookhaven National Laboratory near New York; as well as experiments in Italy, in France, and in Germany.

Additionally, Grynyov noted the significance of both JINR and MKB Raduga being located in the city of Dubna, where Raduga manufactures aircraft components and Kh-101 missiles used in attacks on Ukraine, such as that on Okhmatdyt children’s Hospital in Kyiv.

JINR’s Impact Beyond the Russia-Ukraine War

Russia’s use of JINR and its partners for military R&D has consequences far beyond the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. It ultimately may serve as a conduit of information to the Kremlin’s allies North Korea and Iran, which signed defense treaties with Moscow in 2024 and 2025 respectively. Thus, Moscow’s burgeoning cooperation with each threatens not just the U.S. and Europe but also nations in the Middle East and East Asia. JINR’s coordination with the two terrorism-supporting regimes is channeled through the Special Economic Zone of Dubna (SEZ) and Dubna State University, as evidenced by the SEZ’s 2023 cooperation agreement with Iran and an April 2024 North Korean ministerial visit.

JINR’s 2025 Topical Plan lists at least five Iranian organizations, at least one of which is known to have connections to Iran’s nuclear program. Such a major informational breach has been met with only half-measures from Europe. In December 2024, Peter Beyer, a member of the German Bundestag for the Christian Democratic Union party (CDU), submitted a letter to the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, regarding Russian scientific espionage by JINR, among other institutions. Noting several of the risks articulated by Professor Grynyov, Beyer called upon the EU to take measures against Russian scientific institutions receiving and repurposing scientific information for its defense sector. He considers American and Ukrainian sanctions against Rosatom a step in the right direction, though they leave several gaps.

Upon reaching out to Mr. Beyer for his opinion of how Europe should proceed, he recommended a stronger response:

The only way to counter Russian scientific espionage is to stop allowing malign actors to hide behind ‘scientific neutrality’ when the actions by these organizations are clearly not peaceful. I believe that comprehensive sanctions, without loopholes, on JINR and its key collaborators, the National Research Centre Kurchatov Institute and Rosatom, are needed to efficiently counter Russian scientific espionage in Europe and the U.S.

Russian subversion of multilateral organizations for political ends is not new. What Dr. Janusz Bugajski, a pre-eminent scholar of Eastern Europe security, called in his Center for European Policy Analysis article “salami tactics,” the step-by-step subversion of an organization or political system, has been part of the Russian espionage playbook for decades. First coined in relation to the Sovietization of Eastern Europe, Russia has long employed this approach within international organizations to render them either ineffective or inadvertently advancing Russian interests. Russian malfeasance was obvious in the OSCE and brought the organization to near total paralysis. In the Arctic Council, a confrontation arose, resulting in Russia’s expulsion from the organization.

How Can the West Combat the Russian Scientific Threat?

Even in the highly unlikely event that every single Russian scientist at CERN or other international scientific institutions is personally opposed to the war in Ukraine, expelling them and ending cooperation with JINR remains a crucial European interest. These scientists often have career or family ties in Russia that can be coercively exploited by Russian authorities. Furthermore, even if they don’t support Putin’s war, their work legitimizes Russian participation in international organizations as “business as usual.”

Russia’s involvement in advanced scientific organizations like CERN through JINR poses a long-term threat. By granting Moscow access to scientific discoveries that could be repurposed for its defense industry or enhance its legitimacy, European institutions are equipping it to sustain its invasion, escalate threats against European nations, and empower its sanctioned allies as they work to destabilize the world, shifting the balance of power in favor of Moscow and Beijing. By allowing these activities to continue under the veneer of scientific neutrality, Europe and its institutions needlessly create global security risks and threaten the legitimacy of these vital multilateral scientific organizations.

JINR was contacted and did not comment on this story at the time of publication.