Russia's financial watchdog, Rosfinmonitoring, added popular detective writer Grigory Chkhartishvili, known under the pen name Boris Akunin, to its list of terrorists and extremists without any explanation on December 18.
Mediazona website reported that Akunin’s name is marked with a star in the Rosfinmonitoring's registry, which means that a probe on terrorism charges might have been launched against the writer.
Interfax news agency cited a source on December 18, saying that a probe on charge of discrediting Russian armed forces was launched against Akunin.
The move comes less than a week after one of Russia's largest book publishers, AST, and the country's biggest bookstore chain, Chitai-Gorod-Bukvoyed, announced that they dropped Akunin and Dmitry Bykov, another popular writer, over their pro-Ukrainian and anti-Russian comments.
According to Russian laws, bank accounts of individuals added to the terrorists' list are automatically frozen in the country.
On December 14, Russian lawmaker Andrei Gurulyov publicly said that Akunin "must be annihilated" for his words about Russian armed forces involved in Moscow’s ongoing unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
"Who is Akunin? An enemy! And we have already said that the enemy must be annihilated. I do not know when we all agree that no matter where he is, here or abroad, or elsewhere, the man who wishes his country's defeat, who wishes the death to Russian people, must be destroyed," Gurulyov said.
In October, all Russian theaters staging performances of Akunin's works removed his name from posters. Also, the Moscow House of Books was forced to remove Akunin's books from visible places at its exhibitions.
Akunin was among dozens of Russian writers who openly condemned Russia's aggression against Ukraine last year. On February 24 last year, immediately after the beginning of Russia's aggression, he wrote on Facebook that "a new horrible epoch started" in Russia.
"To the last moment I could not believe that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin will launch this absurd war and I was wrong. I have always believed that in the end, common sense will win, and I was wrong. Madness won," Akunin wrote.
Akunin left Russia in 2014, and currently resides in London.