News you may have missed #0230

December 23, 2009 by 3 Comments

  • Ukrainians claim netting ‘spies among diplomats’. In the last 6 months of 2009, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has “exposed 7 spies among diplomats”, according to its director, Valentyn Nalyvajchenko. He apparently cited “a case of a Russian spy who was charged with obtaining defense industry secrets for a Chinese special service”. If anyone out there has information on this case, please contact us.
  • France launches new spy satellite. France has launched a military spy satellite, Helios 2B, part of a boost in spending on independent surveillance. The satellite can reportedly tell whether a truck convoy is moving or halted and whether a nuclear reactor is operational or not.
  • Seized N. Korean weapons destined for Middle East: US spy chief. An illicit North Korean arms shipment seized in Thailand last week was destined for the Middle East, US director of national intelligence Dennis Blair, has claimed. Blair’s comment, which was meant to tout improved cooperation among America’s 16 intelligence agencies, was the first official confirmation of the US role in the case.

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News you may have missed #0229

December 22, 2009 by 1 Comment

  • Russians claim outing ‘100 spies’ in Novosibirsk in 2009. Siberian scientific centers in Novosibirsk, and especially in its suburb of Akademgorodok, nicknamed “science city” by the Russians, are noted for their research in the fields of oil and gas geology, nanotechnology, creation of new materials, and biochemistry, among other subjects. See here for previous intelNews reporting on this issue.
  • Obama proposes liaison exchange with North Korea. US President Barack Obama has proposed setting up a liaison office in North Korea –something like a US Interests Section– in a letter to leader Kim Jong Il. Such a move would help augment the US’ meager intelligence gathering in North Korea.
  • Estonian phone, web data tapped by Swedish intelligence? The Estonian Security Police (KaPo) has cautioned Estonian telecommunications users to avoid discussing “sensitive subjects” by phone and on the Internet, after an Estonian newspaper revealed that large chunks of Estonia’s telecommunications traffic pass through Sweden before reaching the outside world.

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News you may have missed #0223 (Iran special)

December 17, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • US tells China it can’t stop Israel from striking Iran indefinitely. Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz claims that “senior officials in Jerusalem” said US President Barack Obama recently warned his Chinese counterpart that “the United States would not be able to keep Israel from attacking Iranian nuclear installations for much longer”.
  • Iranian memo puzzles Western spy agencies. Does this two-page memorandum, written in Persian, provide an accurate account of the status of Iran’s nuclear program? “Some people think this is the smoking gun”, one senior European official said on Tuesday, “and others say it will be very hard to prove if it’s authentic”.
  • Iran claims capture of Western spy in Qom. An Iranian state-owned television station has announced the alleged capture two months ago of a spy for a Western intelligence agency who is said to have gathered information on Iran’s uranium enrichment site at Qum. But some observers have questioned the report.

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News you may have missed #0221

December 15, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • Part 5 of CIA defector’s writings now available. Former FBI counterintelligence agent Robert Eringer has published the fifth installment of the writings of Edward Lee Howard, a CIA officer who defected to the USSR in 1985 (see here for previous intelNews coverage). In this part, Howard explains why Bratislava, Czechoslovakia (now Slovakia), was a “good town for covert operations” and the KGB’s “favorite pad for launching agents into Western Europe”.
  • African Union investigates officials of spying. Two officials from the African Union Mission for Somalia (AMISOM) and the United Nations Support Office for AMISOM (UNSOA) are reportedly under investigation for passing on sensitive information on AMISOM and Somalia to the US Defense Intelligence Agency and the South African Secret Service.

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US government agent detained in Cuba for ‘aiding opposition groups’

December 15, 2009 by Leave a comment

Development Alternatives Inc. logo

DAI logo

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
American authorities have revealed the arrest in Cuba of a US government worker, who was allegedly supplying telecommunications equipment to opposition groups. The unidentified man, who was reportedly detained in Havana on December 5, is said to work for a Maryland-based international aid group called Development Alternatives Inc. (DAI). This little-known organization works closely with the government-owned United States Agency for International Development (USAID), and last year was awarded a major government contract in “support [of] the rule of law and human rights, political competition and consensus building” in Cuba. There are reports, however, that the contract involved the clandestine supply of laptop computers and cell phones to Cuban groups antagonistic to the government in Havana. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #0220

December 14, 2009 by 1 Comment

  • More on sudden death of Jordan’s ex-spy chief. The Washington Post‘s David Ignatius is one of a handful of US columnists who are paying attention to the sudden death in Vienna, Austria, of Saad Kheir, 56, former director of Jordan’s General Intelligence Department.
  • Deposed Thai leader back in Cambodia, as accused spy is pardoned. Cambodian authorities have decided to free Siwarak Chothipong, whom they accused last month of spying on the flight itinerary of visiting former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. Meanwhile, Thaksin is back in Cambodia, a sign that the country will continue to back pro-Thaksin political forces in Thailand.

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News you may have missed #0216

December 11, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • China launches new spy satellite. Beijing says the satellite will be used for “land resources surveys [and] crop yield estimates”, but outside experts say it is likely an electro-optical spy satellite that will be operated by the Chinese military.
  • Man accused of spying on Israeli military chief may go free. Arab Israeli Rawi Sultani was arrested last August for allegedly spying on Israel’s military chief, Lieutenant-General Gabi Ashkenazi, on behalf of Lebanese group Hezbollah. But he may be released due to a technical oversight by the prosecutors.

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News you may have missed #0214

December 10, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • Cuban Five member’s prison term cut to 30 years. A Miami court has reduced the earlier prison sentence of yet another member of the Cuban Five. Ramon Labanino has had his original sentence of life imprisonment cut to 30 years. The Cuban Five were sentenced in 2001 for spying on US soil for Cuba.
  • Part 3 of CIA defector’s writings now available. Former FBI counterintelligence agent Robert Eringer has published the third installment of the writings of Edward Lee Howard, a CIA officer who defected to the USSR in 1985 (see here for previous intelNews coverage). Did you know that “KGB officers always preferred Malév (Hungary’s national airline) whenever they crossed to [Western] Europe”?

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News you may have missed #0213

December 10, 2009 by Leave a comment

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Real-life story behind Indian spy novel revealed

December 8, 2009 by 8 Comments

Mission to Pakistan by Maloy Krishna Dhar

Book cover

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
A few years ago, Maloy Krishna Dhar, a longtime veteran of India’s Central Intelligence Bureau (CIB), wrote Mission to Pakistan, a spy novel about the ongoing intelligence war between nuclear powers India and Pakistan. Since 2002, when the novel was published, Dhar has maintained that the exploits of his protagonist, an undercover Indian spy leading a double life inside the Pakistani armed forces, were based on the true story of an unnamed CIB agent who was active in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It now appears that the real-life story behind the book is that of Ravindra Kaushik, an accredited CIB agent who moved to Pakistan from Dubai, converted to Islam, married a Pakistani woman, and joined the country’s Army under the cover name “Nabi Ahmed”. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #0208

December 7, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • Georgia denies entry to Russian ‘spies’. Georgia has denied entry to a delegation of Russian scholars from the Russian State Archive and the Center for Caucasian Research at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations. It’s the second time this year that the Georgians have accused Russian researchers of being spies.
  • US monitors China’s hiring of foreign journalists. A report by the Open Source Center of the US Directorate of National Intelligence notes that China has been hiring a growing number of foreign reporters to serve as overseas correspondents.
  • Audio interview with NSA’s information assurance director. Dickie George, technical director of information assurance at the US National Security Agency, has given a rare audio interview to GovInfo Security. The first part of the interview is available here. The second part will be posted in a few days.

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News you may have missed #0207

December 6, 2009 by Leave a comment

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News you may have missed #0205

December 3, 2009 by Leave a comment

  • Iran plans to charge five British yachtsmen as spies. Iran’s espionage trials against Westerners are becoming as predictable as the stupidity of said Westerners who keep entering Iranian territory without the necessary travel documentation.
  • CIA recruiting in Guam (of all places). The Agency tells University of Guam students that they should attend its recruitment information session if they are “interested in foreign affairs, […] enjoy foreign travel and have an aptitude to learn foreign languages”.

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Israeli listening bugs found in UN meeting room: Swiss paper

December 2, 2009 by Leave a comment

The UN in Geneva

The UN in Geneva

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Switzerland’s most esteemed newspaper has revealed that a number of listening devices, most likely of Israeli origin, were discovered in a room designated for sensitive meetings on disarmament issues, at the United Nations building in Geneva. The Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ), quoted “a senior official” of the Service for Analysis and Prevention (Dienst für Analyse und Prävention), Switzerland’s domestic intelligence agency, who said the bugs were among several discovered throughout the building during regular maintenance work in 2006. The anonymous official said counterintelligence experts drew on “technical and geopolitical criteria” to create a shortlist of the possible culprits. Israel topped the list, which also included North Korea, Britain, China, Russia, France and the United States. Read more of this post

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Analysis: The role of spies in Latin America

December 1, 2009 by Leave a comment

Latin America

Latin America

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
These days it’s a full-time job keeping up with intelligence news coming out of Latin America. In recent weeks alone, there were major spy scandals involving the busting of an alleged Colombian espionage ring in Venezuela, the acknowledgment by Bogotá that it spied on Ecuador, and the ongoing high-level intelligence scandal that some say may cause recalls of diplomats between Chile and Peru. So what is going on in Latin America? How widespread is espionage in the continent and is it on the rise? The BBC’s Juan Paullier has consulted several regional and international experts for his well-written analysis on the subject. Read more of this post

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