News you may have missed #522 (European Union edition)

June 23, 2011 by Leave a comment

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News you may have missed #512

May 25, 2011 by Leave a comment

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Hundreds of European mercenaries ‘fighting for Gaddafi’

April 28, 2011 by 1 Comment

Libya

Libya

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Hundreds of European mercenaries, including large numbers of European Union citizens, have voluntarily enrolled in the armed forces of the Libyan government, and are fighting under the command of Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi. According to criminologist Michel Koutouzis, the Greek CEO of a French-registered consulting firm with connections to Libya, up to 500 European soldiers-of-fortune have been hired by the Libyan government to provide “special services”, particularly in heavy weaponry and attack helicopters. Koutouzis says that most of the European mercenaries, who sell their services for thousands of dollars a day, come from Eastern Europe, especially Poland, Belarus, Ukraine and Serbia, but there are also French, British and Greek nationals currently in Libya. He also claims that Gaddafi is supported by serving military personnel from Russia, Syria and Algeria. It is believed that the Gaddafi camp is also employing thousands of non-specialist mercenaries from various African nations, including Somalia, Mali, Niger, Chad, and the Central African Republic. Unconfirmed reports have surfaced in the American press that the Gaddafi forces are employing female snipers from Colombia. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #498

April 16, 2011 by Leave a comment

  • US claims Iran helping Syria crackdown. Iran is secretly helping Syrian President Bashar al-Assad put down pro-democracy demonstrations, according to US officials, who say Tehran is providing gear to suppress crowds and assistance blocking and monitoring protesters’ use of the Internet, cellphones and text-messaging.
  • Frenchmen arrested in Pakistan. One of the French citizens is of Pakistani origin and the other is a Caucasian convert to Islam; the two had apparently intended to travel to Pakistan’s North Waziristan region, where al-Qaida’s top command is based, for terrorist training, according to a US official.
  • Did US blow up its old spy satellite? The US military’s huge reconnaissance satellite Lacrosse 2, which was launched 20 years ago, has been reported by amateur satellite observers as missing in action –a sign that the classified spacecraft may have been purposely destroyed in Earth’s atmosphere.

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News you may have missed #483

March 15, 2011 by Leave a comment

  • Ex-CIA chief criticizes ‘too much cybersecurity secrecy’. In an article published in the new issue of the US Air Force’s Strategic Studies Quarterly, former CIA and NSA Director, General Michael “I-want-to-shut-down-the-Internet” Hayden, argues that the US government classifies too much information on cybersecurity vulnerabilities.
  • Renault arrests security chief over spy hoax. Dominique Gevrey, a ex-military intelligence agent, who is French car maker Renault’s chief of security, has been arrested in Paris, just before boarding a flight to Guinea in West Africa. He is accused of concocting the spying allegations which shook the French car giant –-and the entire motoring world-– last January. Meanwhile, Renault has apologized to the three senior executives who were fired after being accused of selling secrets about the company’s electric car strategy to “foreign interests”.
  • Analysis: Gadhafi’s spies keep watch in Libyan rebel capital. “Pro-Gaddafi spies are blamed for assassinations, grenade attacks, and sending rebels threatening text messages. Rebels believe that Gaddafi’s forces are all around them. They lurk outside the Benghazi courthouse that serves as the Capitol for the liberated east, sometimes armed with cameras. They sit in vans outside hotels that house journalists and aid workers, and silently watch who comes and goes”.

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News you may have missed #472

January 27, 2011 by 1 Comment

  • French spies become embroiled in Renault’s espionage saga (corrected). The Renault spying saga has taken a new turn with the carmaker accusing France’s domestic intelligence agency DGSE DCRI of sabotaging its reputation. Jean Reinhart, Renault’s lawyer, said that the DGSE DCRI had leaked details of the inquiry into accusations of industrial espionage.
  • Palestinian Authority documents leaked by ex-MI6 agent. Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Wednesday in an interview that a US citizen, who worked in the US State Department, and a British former MI6 official, are responsible for leaking the so-called ‘Palestine papers‘.
  • NY Times editor calls Assange ‘spy-like’. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange resembles a character from a detective novel and is “elusive, manipulative and volatile”, the executive editor of The New York Times says in an upcoming book. Open Secrets: WikiLeaks, War and American Diplomacy, a digital book featuring an introduction by Times executive editor Bill Keller and contributions from other Times reporters, goes on sale Monday.

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News you may have missed #468

January 14, 2011 by Leave a comment

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News you may have missed #466

January 7, 2011 by Leave a comment

  • France blasts economic warfare by industrial spies. The French government says it is the victim of an economic war, after Renault, France’s partially state-owned carmaker, suspended three top executives over leaks of secret electric-car technology. The French intelligence services are probing a possible Chinese connection. It should be noted that, according to US estimates, France leads industrial spying in Europe.
  • Canada a target for foreign interference, says spy chief. A keenly anticipated report by Canadian Security Intelligence Service director Richard Fadden paints a picture of a broad threat of foreign interference from countries out to influence Canada’s policy and politicians, target dissidents and pilfer technology. It is the most detailed articulation of the spy service’s concerns about overtures from foreign agents, including two suspected cases involving provincial cabinet ministers.
  • Jordanian Hamas spy awarded PhD in jail. Jordanian Azzam Jaber, jailed in Jordan for spying for the Palestinian group Hamas on potential targets including the Israeli embassy, has obtained his doctorate from the University of Yarmuk.

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News you may have missed #465

January 5, 2011 by Leave a comment

  • Germany denies secret spy collaboration with the US. Germany’s aerospace center denied Monday that it is working with the US on a $270 million high-tech secret spy program, insisting that its plans for a high-resolution optical satellite have purely scientific and security uses. The denial was in response to US State Department cables obtained by WikiLeaks and revealed by Norwegian daily Aftenposten.
  • Was Iranian nuclear defector tortured? Iranian nuclear scientist Shahram Amiri, who returned to Tehran in July after what he called a “kidnapping” by the CIA, has been held in detention by Iranian authorities for two months and tortured so badly he was hospitalized, according to a dissident Iranian web site.
  • WikiLeaks reveals France leads industrial spying in Europe. France is the country that conducts the most industrial espionage on other European countries, even ahead of China and Russia, according to leaked US diplomatic cables, reported in a translation by Agence France Presse of Norwegian daily Aftenposten‘s reporting.

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News you may have missed #458

December 7, 2010 by Leave a comment

  • More arrests of alleged Russian agents in Georgia. The government of Georgia arrested six people suspected of being agents for Russia and accused them of staging a series of explosions, including one outside the US embassy in capital Tbilisi. At least 13 more people were arrested last month in Georgia, and are facing charges of spying for Moscow.
  • Iran defector says Tehran hosted N. Korean techs. Mohammad Reza Heydari, who resigned in January from his post as Iranian consul in Norway, and defected to the West, has told a conference in Paris that he saw North Korean technicians “repeatedly” travel to Iran.
  • Spy scandal MP helped second Russian woman stay in UK. British Liberal Democrat parliamentarian Mike Hancock, whose assistant, Katia Zatuliveter, is accused by MI5 of spying for Russia, helped 25-year-old Russian citizen Ekaterina Paderina stay in Britain after she ran into visa problems, in the late 1990s.

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News you may have missed #453

November 18, 2010 by Leave a comment

  • France accuses Iran of violence at Tehran embassy. A diplomatic standoff between France and Iran has ensued, after Paris accused Iran’s security services of committing “unacceptable acts of violence” on French diplomatic personnel at the French embassy in Tehran. The alleged incident happened as guests gathered at the embassy for a traditional Persian music concert. Iranian plainclothes security forces and uniformed police stopped about two-thirds of 130 invited guests from entering the building, and an unknown number of people were seen being taken away in unmarked vans.
  • CIA picks Air Force general to lead military ops office. The CIA announced Monday that it has chosen an Air Force Lt. Gen. Kurt A. Cichowski, who has extensive experience in Predator drones, to head its military affairs office. In 2009, Cichowski called the CIA drone assassination program a “phenomenal […] success”.
  • Aussie spies spooked out by student filmmakers. Three media students filming a tourist site near the controversial new headquarters of Australia’s spy organization, ASIO, in Canberra, prompted a late-night police check, apparently over security concerns.

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British citizen among Mossad assassins intrigues investigators

October 20, 2010 by Leave a comment

Christopher Lockwood

Lockwood

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Only a handful of the 33 members of an Israeli assassination squad, who killed a senior Hamas member in Dubai last January, carried non-fraudulent passports. Most of the assassins, who in all probability worked for Kidon, an elite assassination unit within Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency, used forged British, Irish, German, Australian, and other passports. Dubai officials investigating the murder of Hamas weapons procurer Mahmoud al-Mabhouh have identified at least one British citizen among non-fraudulent passport holders in the Mossad assassination team: he is 62-year-old Christopher Lockwood (photo), who helped facilitate al-Mabhouh’s assassination by transporting some of the Mossad members around Dubai “in a [rented] white minivan with tinted windows”. Read more of this post

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News you may have missed #432

September 17, 2010 by Leave a comment

  • French spy agency chief warns of high terror risk. Bernard Squarcini, director of France’s Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire (DST) counterintelligence agency, has warned that the country’s military presence in Afghanistan is among the reasons that have made France a prime target for radical Islamist groups.
  • Iran frees one of three Americans held on spy charges. American Sarah Shourd, who has been held in Iran for more than a year on suspicion of spying, has been released by authorities in the Islamic Republic.
  • American civil rights photographer was FBI informant. New information shows that celebrated civil rights-era photographer Ernest Withers had been a paid informant for the FBI, reporting on the whereabouts and activities of the movement’s leaders, many of whom considered him a personal friend.

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Comment: Is Lebanon Using US Assistance to Capture Israeli Agents?

August 5, 2010 by 5 Comments

Lebanon

Lebanon

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
A minor revolution has been taking place in Lebanon over the past 16 months. Since April of 2009, Lebanese authorities have arrested nearly 100 individuals on charges of spying for Israel, three of whom have been sentenced to death. Judging by numbers alone, this may be one of the most astonishing coups in the annals of counterintelligence. There are several reasons why this is happening.

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Comment: Defector’s Wish to Return to Iran Not Unusual

July 14, 2010 by 5 Comments

Shahram Amiri

Shahram Amiri

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
This website has covered extensively the case of Dr. Shahram Amiri, a scientific researcher employed in Iran’s nuclear program, who disappeared during a religious pilgrimage to Mecca in May or June of 2009. Tehran maintains that Dr. Amiri was abducted by CIA agents. However, most intelligence observers, including this writer, believe that the Iranian researcher willfully defected to the West, following a long, carefully planned intelligence operation involving the CIA, as well as French and German intelligence agencies.

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