Belarus puts on trial members of alleged Polish military spy ring

May 6, 2009 by Leave a comment

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Very little information has appeared in Western news outlets of an ongoing trial in Belarus of four army officers accused of spying for Poland. The four, all of whom are Belarusian, are accused by Belarus security officials of collaborating with Polish intelligence agents by providing them with classified data on Belarusian military technologies, as well as with information on Russia’s air defense system, of which Belarus is a partner. A fifth alleged member of the spy ring, who is a Russian military officer, is facing similar charges in Moscow. The four Belarusians were reportedly arrested several months ago by the KGB, Belarus’ intelligence service. The discovery of the alleged spy ring led to a major political scandal in Minsk, prompting the dismissal of KGB’s director, Stepan Sukhorenko, by Belarus’ longtime President, Alexander Lukashenko. If convicted of treason and espionage, the army officers could technically face the death penalty under Belarusian law.

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Psychologists behind CIA torture named

May 5, 2009 by Leave a comment

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
Two American psychologists behind the CIA’s “enhanced interrogation” program, which the President of the United States has described as torture, have been named by ABC News. They are Jim Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, former military officers and partners in Mitchell, Jessen and Associates, a company based in Spokane, WA. The two psychologists were hired by the CIA to design an elaborate ten-stage interrogation program, which culminated in waterboarding. Interestingly, the Agency hired the two scientists, offering them a lucrative $1000-a-day contract, without checking whether they had any experience in interrogation techniques. Agency officials later discovered that Mitchell and Jessen has significantly less professional experience in the psychology of interrogation than they had led the CIA to believe. The two psychologists were contacted by ABC News, but declined to comment, citing non-disclosure contracts with the CIA.

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Charges dropped against AIPAC lobbyists involved in Franklin spy case

May 4, 2009 by 2 Comments

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
As intelNews reported on April 23, based on a tip by The Washington Post, it has been announced that the two American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) lobbyists involved in the Lawrence Franklin spy case in the US will escape trial. Lawrence Anthony Franklin was a US Defense Department analyst who in 2006 was given a 12-year prison sentence for handing classified US military information to Israeli agent Uzi Arad, Israeli Embassy official Naor Gilon, as well as to Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, both former AIPAC lobbyists. But on Friday US Justice Department prosecutors dropped all charges against the two former AIPAC members due to “significant reservations about the case”, even though several Department officials believe that Rosen and Weissman “acted imprudently”, according to The New York Times. As IntelNews has learned, the decision was taken despite significant objections from FBI officials, who desperately pressured the Department to go forward with the trial until the very last minute. Read more of this post

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Article on formerly unknown Soviet spy published

April 24, 2009 by Leave a comment

George Koval

George Koval

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
On November 2, 2007, some of Russia’s most senior military and intelligence officials gathered at the Kremlin to honor a Soviet spy whose name was until then completely absent from the annals of espionage history. Russian defense minister Anatoly Serdyukov and Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU) chief Valentin Korabelnikov were among several officials who joined Russian president Vladimir Putin to pay tribute to George Koval. Koval was an American citizen born in Iowa to immigrant parents from Belarus. In 1932, Koval, his parents and two brothers, all of whom were US citizens, moved back to the then rapidly developing Soviet Union to escape the effects of the Great Depression. It was there that the young George Koval was recruited by the GRU, the foreign military intelligence directorate of the General Staff of the Soviet Armed Forces. He received Soviet citizenship and returned to the US through San Francisco in October 1940. Read more of this post

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Agents fired as probe into Colombian wiretap scandal continues

April 24, 2009 by Leave a comment

Juan M. Santos

Juan M. Santos

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
Colombia’s Administrative Department of Security (Departamento Administrativo de Seguridad, or DAS) suffered one of the most extensive purges in its history this week, when 22 of its detectives were fired in connection with an investigation into illegal wiretapping. Last January, the scandal-prone counterintelligence service was revealed to have engaged in systematic communications interception against several public figures in Colombian political life. Those targeted included Supreme Court judges, prominent journalists, as well as the chief of the Colombian National Police, former president Cesar Gaviria, and even the minister of defense Juan Manuel Santos. The warrantless interceptions appeared to be part of a concerted effort to discover the “vices and weaknesses” of public figures, including “details about sexual preferences”, extra-marital affairs, and liquor or drug habits. Read more of this post

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French energy giant denies it spied on Greenpeace

April 22, 2009 by Leave a comment

ÉDF's Paris HQ

ÉDF's Paris HQ

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
Earlier this month, intelNews reported that senior security officials at France’s state-owned electricity service provider were among several people charged by French authorities with spying on Greenpeace and other environmental groups. Now, several days after the launch of an official investigation into the matter, the company, Électricité de France (ÉDF), continues to blame the scandal on renegade and overzealous security personnel. Speaking to French newspaper Le Monde on April 21, ÉDF’s director of security, Jean-Marc Sabathé, insisted that the company’s senior management had not been consulted about the spying operation. ÉDF has already suspended two security officials, Pierre Durieux and Pierre Francois, who hired private investigations firm Kargus Consultant to infiltrate environmental organizations that oppose the expansion of ÉDF’s nuclear energy reactor plants throughout France. Read more of this post

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Swedish NATO troops covertly approached on Facebook

April 21, 2009 by Leave a comment

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
Members of Sweden’s armed forces serving with NATO’s International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan have been systematically approached via online networking application Facebook, and asked to provide details on NATO’s military presence in the country. According to Sweden’s Dagens Nyheter newspaper, several such incidents have occurred in recent weeks, leading Swedish intelligence officials to the conclusion that the online courting is part of a wider intelligence operation directed against NATO. The incidents have been confirmed by Mårten Wallén, who heads the Information Security Unit of Sweden’s Military Intelligence and Security Service (MUST). Read more of this post

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MI5 looking for new chief scientific adviser

April 18, 2009 by Leave a comment

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
The MI5 is openly advertising for a chief scientific adviser for the first time. Britain’s foremost counterintelligence agency, which is also known as the Security Service, has posted the job advertisement on its website, and is asking interested individuals to submit applications by April 24. It also urges them to exercise discretion by discussing the application “only with [their] partner and/or immediate family”. The brief advertisement describes the “unique and challenging” mission of the new position as “lead[ing] and co-ordinat[ing] the scientific work of the Security Service”. Read more of this post

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More US Muslim groups allege FBI harassment

April 18, 2009 by 1 Comment

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Less than a month after Californian Muslim groups accused the FBI of planting informants in mosques and Islamic centers, the Council of Islamic Organizations of Michigan said it has asked the US Attorney General to look into complaints of FBI infiltration of Islamic centers. The group, which represents one America’s largest Muslim populations, accuses the Bureau of engaging in a “fishing expedition” by approaching Islamic center worshippers and asking them to report on activities, including donations, taking place in mosques. In its letter to US Attorney General Erik Holder, the group said the FBI appears to be specifically targeting Muslim immigrants “with pending immigration issues”, asking them to work as informers in return for assistance with their immigration petitions. Read more of this post

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Lebanese arrest second member of Israeli spy ring

April 17, 2009 by Leave a comment

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Early yesterday morning I wrote that Adib Al-Alam, a retired Lebanese brigadier general who was arrested last Saturday on charges of spying for Israel, was “part of a wider spy ring operating out of the town of Bint Jbeil, in southern Lebanon, and that more arrests are likely to follow before too long”. Several hours later, Lebanese officials announced the arrest of J’ Al-Alam, nephew of Abid Al-Alam, in the town of Naqoura, on charges of spying for Israel. Like his uncle, J’ Al-Alam is a Lebanese Christian and, like is uncle, is rumored to be an employee “in a non-civilian capacity” of Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces (ISF). Read more of this post

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NSA tried to spy on US Congress member

April 17, 2009 by 3 Comments

Thomas Tamm

Thomas Tamm

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
An anonymous intelligence official has told The New York Times that the National Security Agency (NSA) attempted to wiretap the personal communications of a US Congressman without court approval. The gigantic US government agency, which is tasked with worldwide communications surveillance, as well as communications security, believed that the Congressman “was in contact […] with an extremist who had possible terrorist ties and was already under surveillance”, said the paper. NSA agents tried therefore to set in motion a warrantless communications interception operation against the Congressman, while he participated in a “Congressional delegation to the Middle East”, either in 2005 or 2006. Read more of this post

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Lebanese arrest former general on spying charges

April 16, 2009 by Leave a comment

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
For the past several months, intelNews has been keeping an eye on the intensifying intelligence war between Lebanon and Israel. In late 2008 and early 2009, Lebanese military intelligence agents busted up a number of autonomous Israeli spy rings operating in the country. On Tuesday, an anonymous source inside Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces (ISF) announced the arrest of a retired Lebanese brigadier general on charges of spying for Israel. The arrestee’s identity is not yet known, and Lebanese media have named him only as “Adib A.”. But Lebanese government sources have disclosed that the retired general has admitted spying on behalf of Israel for over a decade, and that he “regularly met with his Israeli contacts at European destinations”. Read more of this post

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Canada aggressively infiltrated by spies, claims new report

April 15, 2009 by Leave a comment

Jim Judd

Jim Judd

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) has warned that operations by foreign intelligence agents inside Canada are intensifying. In its annual public report to Canada’s House of Commons, the spy agency says foreign spies operating in Canada are hoping to gain access to military technologies employed by NATO, of which Canada is a member. Foreign operatives are also interested in information on several business sectors ranging from biotechnology and agriculture to oil exploration, aerospace engineering and mining, says the report. The 36-page document, which includes a lengthy introduction by CSIS director Jim Judd, does not mention specific nations as responsible for these operations. But a Reuters report from Canada reminds that China has traditionally been high on CSIS’s list of suspects. Informed observers may recall that in 2005 a Chinese government defector claimed there were at least 1,000 accredited and covert Chinese spies operating in Canada.

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Western companies sold phone spy equipment to Iran

April 15, 2009 by 2 Comments

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
For about a year now, political dissidents in Iran have suspected that the Iranian government’s ability to spy on private communications has intensified, covering for the first time cell phone and instant messaging exchanges. Last Monday it emerged that two European telecommunications hardware manufacturers are actually behind the Iranian government’s increased surveillance capabilities. The Wall Street Journal reports that Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) sold Iran Telecom –Iran’s government-owned telecommunications provider– a sophisticated surveillance system, in the summer of 2008. NSN is an engineering partnership between Finland’s Nokia Corporation and German hardware manufacturer Siemens AG, Europe’s largest engineering firm. Read more of this post

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CIA terminates secret prisons but rejects prosecutions

April 12, 2009 by 2 Comments

Leon Panetta

Leon Panetta

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
In a statement issued on Thursday morning, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) said it will terminate its secret prison network and would “decommission” all of its overseas prison sites. The news was undoubtedly welcomed by many intelligence professionals who took issue with the use of techniques that President Barack Obama has described as “torture [that] betrayed American values, alienated allies and became a recruiting tool for al Qaeda”. Speaking to The New York Times, the director of Human Rights Watch’s Terrorism and Counterterrorism Program, Joanne Mariner, said the news was “incredibly heartening and important”. But she called for initiating criminal investigations against those at the CIA who implemented the institutionalization of torture. This is highly unlikely, however. In an email to CIA staff, the Agency’s new Director, Leon E. Panetta, repeated last week the standard CIA position that those responsible for implementing and carrying out torture during the Bush Administration “should not be investigated, let alone punished”. Read more of this post

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