Foreign Intelligence Service (Russia)

The Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation or SVR RF (Russian: СВР РФ) is Russia's external intelligence agency.

It is mainly concerned with civilian affairs. The SVR RF succeeded the First Chief Directorate (PGU) of the KGB in December 1991. The SVR has its headquarters in Moscow.

Unlike the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), the SVR does intelligence and espionage activities outside the Russian Federation. It works with the Russian Main Intelligence Directorate {the GRU), its military-affairs espionage counterpart. The SVR is also negotiates anti-terrorist cooperation and intelligence-sharing arrangements with foreign intelligence agencies. It gives analysis and dissemination of intelligence to the Russian president.

SVR RF is the official foreign-operations successor to many Soviet-era foreign intelligence agencies, from the original 'foreign department' of the Cheka under Vladimir Lenin, to the OGPU and NKVD of the Stalinist era, followed by the First Chief Directorate of the KGB.