According to a story reported by Nezavisimaya Gazeta in The Moscow Times:

"The Russian diplomatic convoy that came under fire as it evacuated Baghdad might have been carrying secret Iraqi files that U.S. intelligence officers wanted to seize, Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported Wednesday."

"The newspaper speculated that the archives could be highly valuable to Russia in three major areas: in protecting Russian interests in a postwar Iraq; in determining to what extent the Hussein regime may have financed Russian political parties and movements; and in providing Russia access to intelligence that Iraqi agents conducted in other countries. "