With the recent declassification of secret documents new light has been shed on old mysteries. For example, we now know that what might be termed the "JFK assassination conspiracy industry" was deliberately fueled and manipulated by the KGB so as to distract the CIA and undermine confidence in successive U.S. administrations. Also, new evidence continues to emerge of Vladimir Putins commitment to the extra-judicial elimination of "extremists" overseas, as legitimized by the Duma in July 2006. Controversially, the legislation included a definition of extremists as "those slandering the individual occupying the post of president of the Russian Federation.

TheEncyclopedia of Political Assassinationscontains a chronology, an introduction, and appendixes. The encyclopedia section has more than 700 cross-referenced entries on assassinations, intelligence agencies, politics and foreign relations.

Nigel Westis the European Editor of the International Journal of Intelligence and Counter-Intelligence and teaches the history of postwar intelligence at the Centre for Counterintelligence and Security Studies. He is the author of many books, including the Historical Dictionary of British Intelligence (Scarecrow, 2005), Historical Dictionary of International Intelligence (Scarecrow, 2006), Historical Dictionary of Cold War Counterintelligence (Scarecrow, 2007), and Historical Dictionary of Sexspionage (Scarecrow, 2009). In October 2003 he was awarded the U.S. Association of Former Intelligence Officers' first Lifetime Literature Achievement Award. In 2012 he was appointed a judge of the St Ermins Intelligence Book of the Year award.

Acknowledgments
Authors Note
Abbreviations and Glossary
Chronology
Introduction
The Encyclopedia
Appendix 1 Operation FOXLEY
Appendix II CIA Report,Soviet Use of Assassination and Kidnapping
Appendix III CIAPB/FORTUNE Contingency Plan for Guatemala
Appendix IV CIA ReportThe Attack That Failed: Iraqs Attempt to AssassinateFormer President Bush in Kuwait in April 1993.
Bibliography
Index