Andrey Illarionov is a Russian economist and former senior policy advisor to Vladimir Putin, the President of Russia, from April 2000 to December 2005. Since April 2021, he is a senior fellow at the non-governmental organization Center for Security Policy, which is based out of Washington, D.C. in the United States.
Since leaving his role in the government of the Russian Federation, he’s become a vocal critic of Putin’s administration and particularly its stance on foreign relations (as well as doctrines on energy). For example, in April 2022, Illarionov declared in a news interview that change in the Kremlin would happen “sooner or later” given that “it is absolutely impossible to have any positive future for Russia with the current political regime.”
On 4 February 2014, before the Russian intervention in Crimea, Illarionov predicted that Vladimir Putin was going to implement a military operation to effectively establish political control over Ukraine
In late March 2014, following the Revolution of Dignity and the annexation of Crimea by Russia, speaking to Svenska Dagbladet, Illarionov predicted that Vladimir Putin would seek to incorporate Ukraine, Belarus, parts of Georgia and the Baltic states” into Russia.