Russia | intelNews.org

Russia jailed senior intelligence officers for helping CIA nab notorious hackers

August 25, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 2 Comments

FSB - JF Two senior officers in the Russian intelligence services were charged with treason after they were found to have helped the United States catch two notorious Russian hackers, according to reports in the Russian media. Sergey Mikhailov was a career officer in the Federal Security Service —a descendant of the domestic section of the Soviet-era KGB— which is often referred to as Russia’s equivalent of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation. Mikhailov had risen through the ranks of the FSB to eventually head the agency’s Center for Information Security. Known in Russia as CIB, the Center is tasked with investigating electronic crime in the Russian Federation.

But in December 2016, Mikhailov and one of his trusted deputies in the CIB, Dmitry Dokuchaev, were suddenly removed from their posts and arrested. The arrests marked some of the highest-profile detentions of intelligence officers in Russia since the demise of the Soviet Union. Russian authorities refused to reveal the reasons for the arrests, but confirmed that the two men had been charged with treason. Reports soon surfaced in the Russian media, claiming that Mikhailov and Dokuchaev were arrested for their involvement in a Russian criminal hacker gang. Some Western media, including The New York Times, speculated that the two men may have been arrested for helping US intelligence investigate Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election.

But now a new report alleges that Mikhailov and Dokuchaev were charged with treason after helping the US Central Intelligence Agency catch two prolific Russian hackers. The report was aired on Russian television station TV Dozhd, also known as TV Rain, a privately owned channel based in Moscow, which broadcasts in Russia and several other former Soviet Republics. One of the hackers, Roman Seleznev, known in hacker circles as Track2, reached worldwide notoriety for defrauding major credit card companies of tens of millions of dollars. He was arrested in 2014 in the South Asian island country of Maldives and eventually extradited to the US to stand trial. He was sentenced to 27 years in prison, which he is currently serving. The other hacker, Yevgeniy Nikulin, was arrested in the Czech Republic in 2016, pursuant to a US-issued international arrest warrant. He is now awaiting extradition to the US, where he is expected to be tried for hacking several high-profile companies, including DropBox and LinkedIn.

TV Dozhd said that Russian authorities are also suspecting the men of being members of hacker gangs, but that their main charges relate to their close cooperation with American intelligence agencies, reportedly in exchange for cash.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 25 August 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with computer hacking, Dmitry Dokuchaev, FSB, FSB Center for Information Security, News, Roman Seleznev, Russia, Sergey Mikhailov, United States, Yevgeniy Nikulin

Russian spy services raid bomb lab in Moscow, foil large-scale suicide plot

August 14, 2017 by Ian Allen Leave a comment

ISIS Russia Russian intelligence services say they have foiled a large-scale bomb plot, after raiding an explosives laboratory belonging to the Islamic State and arresting four suspects. The four men were allegedly planning to target the Moscow Metro transit system and a busy shopping center in the Russian capital. In a statement released to the media this morning, the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) did not specify the intended targets of the plotters. But it said it had arrested four people during an early morning raid at an explosives laboratory located in the Moscow suburbs. The FSB said that its officers confiscated large quantities of peroxide-based explosives that resemble the material used by the Islamic State in the November 2015 attacks in Paris, the March 2016 attacks in Brussels, and last May’s suicide bombing in Manchester.

One of the men arrested has been named by the FSB as Akbarzhon A. Dzhalilov, 22, a Kyrghyz-born Russian citizen. The other three men, who have not yet been named, are all from former Soviet Republics of Central Asia. Russian media reported that the Moscow cell was being commanded and directed by the Islamic State in Syria. Two Russian-speaking men from the Russian Caucasus, who are located in Syria, are thought to have been handling the cell’s activities. Russian intelligence services estimate that at least 2,500 Russian citizens have move to the Middle East to join jihadist groups in the past three years.

Had it been carried out, the attack would have been added to a growing list of terrorist incidents against Russia since 2015, which are related to the Kremlin’s decision to enter the Syrian Civil War. In October of that year, the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the bombing of Metrojet Flight 9268, a chartered commercial flight operated by Russian company Kogalymavia. The chartered airliner went down over Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, killing all 217 passengers and crew on board —the worst disaster in Russian aviation history. In November of 2016, the FSB reportedly foiled another attack by five members of the Islamic State in Moscow. In February of this year, a seven-member Islamic State cell was busted in Yekaterinburg, Russia’s fourth-largest city, while it was planning attacks in several metropolitan areas, including Moscow and St. Petersburg. In April, the North Caucasus-based Imam Shamil Battalion claimed responsibility for a suicide attack in the St. Petersburg Metro transit system, which killed 15 train passengers. The group, whose existence was unknown before the St. Petersburgh attack, said it supported al-Qaeda and perpetrated the attack in retaliation for Moscow’s involvement in the Syrian Civil War.

► Author: Ian Allen | Date: 14 August 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Akbarzhon A. Dzhalilov, FSB, Islamic State, News, Russia, Syrian Civil War, terrorism

Russian aid center in Serbia rejects claims that it is an intelligence base

July 13, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis Leave a comment

Staff at a Russian disaster relief center in southern Serbia have rejected claims by American officials that the facility operates as an espionage arm of Moscow’s foreign policy in the Balkans. The Russian-Serbian Humanitarian Center was built in 2012, at a cost of nearly $40 million, following an agreement between Belgrade and Moscow. Its stated mission is to “provide humanitarian emergency response in Serbia and other Balkan states” through the provision of humanitarian assistance to those in need and training local emergency response crews. The center is located in the outskirts of Serbia’s fourth largest city of Niš, not far from the country’s border with Kosovo, a former Serbian province that unilaterally declared independence in 2008. Serbia refuses to recognize Kosovo’s independence, a decision that is strongly backed by Russia. It is also close to the headquarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s peacekeeping force stationed in Kosovo, which houses 4,000 international troops, including 600 Americans.

Western officials have raised concerns that the disaster relief center is in reality an intelligence base, from which Russia conducts some of its espionage operations in the Western Balkans. It has also been suggested that the center could operate as a military base in a potential Russian military operation in the former communist state. In June, the United States Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, Hoyt Brian Yee, publicly described the compound as “the so-called humanitarian center” in Serbia. Speaking during a US Senate hearing on southeastern European politics, Yee said the Department of State was concerned about the center’s unofficial use. He also expressed reservations about Moscow’s request that the Serbian government grants the center diplomatic immunity, similar to that which covers the activities of the Russian embassy in Belgrade.

Moscow responded to American allegations of espionage by inviting local and international media representatives to the center on Wednesday. The center’s co-director, Viacheslav Vlasenko, told reporters that the center was “very open”, adding that its staff consisted of 15 Serbs and five Russians who were dispatched to Serbia from Russia’s Ministry of Emergency Situations, known as EMERCOM. Vlasenko said that Moscow’s request for diplomatic immunity for the center was solely aimed at reducing the annual taxes that the facility had to pay.

Regular readers of intelNews will recall allegations made last October by authorities in Serbia’s neighboring state of Montenegro —later repeated by Britain— that nationalists from Russia and Serbia were behind a failed plot to kill the country’s then-Prime Minister Milo Dukanović and spark a pro-Russian coup in the country. The allegations surfaced after 20 Serbians and Montenegrins were arrested by police in Montenegro on election day, October 16, as Montenegrins were voting across the Balkan country of 650,000 people. In response to allegations that the coup had been hatched in neighboring Serbia, Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vučić said that he would not allow Serbia to “act as the puppet of world powers”, a comment that was clearly directed at Moscow. Russia has vehemently denied the allegations.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 13 July 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Balkans, EMERCOM (Russia), front companies, Hoyt Brian Yee, Ministry of Emergency Situations (Russia), Niš (Serbia), Russia, Russian-Serbian Humanitarian Center, Serbia, United States, Viacheslav Vlasenko

Russia allegedly planning to expel 30 American diplomats in a few weeks

July 12, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 2 Comments

US embassy in Moscow Russia is planning to expel approximately 30 American diplomats from its territory, and seize buildings and property belonging to the United States Department of State, according to Russian media reports. The expulsions will be in response to the expulsion last December of 35 Russian diplomats stationed in the US by the administration of President Barack Obama. In addition to expelling the diplomats, Washington also reclaimed two “recreational facilities” (in reality intelligence outposts) that were used by the Russians in New York and Maryland. The White House said that the expulsions were ordered in response to alleged efforts by Russia to interfere in the 2016 US presidential election.

Observers, including the present author, were confident at the time that the Kremlin would respond in kind. In a surprising move, however, the Russian President Vladimir Putin said he would not respond to Mr. Obama’s move, in the hope that US-Russian relations would improve with the arrival of the new president in the White House. He added that Russia reserved the right to retaliate at a later time. Moscow’s response was met with praise by the then-president-elect Donald Trump and his transition team.

But Russia’s hopes for warmer relations with the US under Mr. Trump’s leadership do not seem to be materializing. A recent article in the daily Russian newspaper Izvestia reported that the Kremlin thought it was “outrageous” that the Trump White House had not yet returned the two seized compounds to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and not rescinded the expulsions of the 35 diplomats and their families. It also claimed that President Putin raised the issue with his US counterpart during their July 7 meeting in the German city of Hamburg. The Moscow-based newspaper quoted unnamed senior Russian officials, who said that Russia was preparing to expel dozens of American diplomats and seize US diplomatic facilities soon.

It appears that Russia will wait until the upcoming meeting between the US Undersecretary of State Thomas Shannon and the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, which has been scheduled for later this month in St. Petersburg. If no US assurances for the return of the compounds and diplomats are made at that time, Moscow will proceed with its tit-for-tat plan. When asked about Izvestia’s article, the Russian Minster of Foreign Affairs, Sergei Lavrov, replied that the Kremlin was “weighing specific measures” in response to last December’s expulsions of Russian diplomats from the US. However, Mr. Lavrov said he did not want to elaborate at the present time, while also refusing to deny the newspaper’s allegations.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 12 July 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with 2016 US presidential election, diplomacy, diplomatic expulsions, Russia, United States

North Korea secretly imports Russian oil through Singapore, says defector

June 29, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 2 Comments

The government of North Korea uses intermediary firms in Singapore to import thousands of tons of Russian oil each year, according to a senior North Korean defector who has spoken publicly for the first time since his defection. Ri Jong-ho was a senior official in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea under its previous leader, the late Kim Jong-il. He rose through the ranks of the Workers’ Party of Korea and was directly mentored by Kim, who personally appointed him to a post in Bureau 39. The powerful body is in charge of securing much-needed foreign currency for Pyongyang —often through illegal activities— and partly funds the personal accounts of the ruling Kim dynasty.

From the mid-1990s until his 2014 defection, Ri spent nearly three decades in senior positions inside the DPRK. These included the chairmanship of the board of the Korea Kumgang Group, a state-managed firm that oversees large-scale economic activity in North Korea, such as constructing energy networks and commissioning oil and natural-gas exploration. Between 1998 and 2004, Ri lived in the Chinese city of Dalian, where he headed the local branch of the Korea Daesong Trading Corporation. The Pyongyang-based company facilitates North Korea’s exports to China in exchange for Chinese goods and products.

But Ri’s mentor, Kim Jong-il, died in 2011. His son and successor, Kim Jong-un, engaged in a brutal campaign to remove his father’s advisers and replace them with his own people. During that time, said Ri, thousands of senior and mid-level officials were purged, some physically. Frightened and disillusioned, Ri defected with his family to South Korea in October 2014; fifteen months later, in March 2016, he arrived in the United States. On Tuesday, the Voice of America published Ri’s first public interview since his defection.

Among other things, the former Bureau 39 official said that the North Korean regime sustains itself with the help of oil it imports from nearby countries. One of the regime’s main sources of energy is Russia, which supplies Pyongyang with between 200,000 and 300,000 tons of oil every year. But the trade does not occur directly, said Ri. Moscow sells the oil to energy-trading companies in Singapore. These mediators then sell the oil to the DPRK through separately agreed contracts, so that Russia does not appear to be providing Pyongyang with desperately needed oil. The so-called “Singapore line” was established by North Korea in the 1990s, said Ri, and appears to still be active. In addition to Russian oil, the DPRK imports approximately 500,000 tons of oil per year from China, through pipelines, according to Ri.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 29 June 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Bureau 39 (North Korea), defectors, energy resources, News, North Korea, Ri Jong-ho, Russia, Singapore

New clues emerge about targeted efforts by Russia to hack US elections

June 9, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 1 Comment

GRU New information about carefully targeted attempts by Russian operatives to compromise the November 2016 presidential elections in the United States have emerged in a newly published intelligence document. The document, which dates from May of this year, was produced by the US National Security Agency and published on June 5 by The Intercept. The web-based outlet published the leaked document on the same day that Reality Leigh Winner, a US federal contractor with a top-security clearance, was charged with espionage for leaking classified documents to the media. This has led to speculation that Winner may be the source of the leak.

The NSA document details attempts by hackers to compromise the online accounts of over 100 election officials, as well as employees of private contractors involved in administering the election process. The attempts reportedly took place during the period leading up to November 8, 2016. To do that, hackers resorted to a technique commonly known as ‘spear-fishing’. They sent carefully crafted emails, claiming to be from Google, to specifically targeted individuals. The goal was to trick the email recipients into downloading and opening Microsoft Word attachments, which were infected with malware. The infected software would then allow the hackers to remotely access the compromised computers. The NSA document states that at least one targeted person had his or her computer compromised though the ‘spear-fishing’ technique. Importantly, the leaked document appears unequivocal in its assessment that the hackers behind the ‘spear-fishing’ attacks worked for the General Staff Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU) of the Russian armed forces. The document also states that the main goal of the attacks was to compromise the software used to manage voter registration lists, and that the attackers were operating under a “cyber espionage mandate specifically directed at US and foreign elections”.

American intelligence officials have previously said that Russian spies launched in a complex and prolonged campaign to undermine public faith in the US electoral process. It is also known that the Russian campaign targeted election officials in the months leading up to the November 2016 elections. But the NSA report is the first publicly available description of some of the specific techniques employed by the alleged Russian hackers as part of their campaign. The leaked document does not provide technical details about the ‘spear-phishing’ campaign. Nor does it discuss whether the attacks were successful, whether vote tallies were actually compromised, or whether the election process itself was sabotaged by the hackers. The Intercept said it contacted the NSA and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, who refused to publicly comment on the content of the NSA report.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 09 June 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with 2016 US presidential election, computer hacking, News, NSA, Russia, United States

Russian espionage in US increasingly sophisticated and brazen, say sources

June 2, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 1 Comment

Russian embassy in Washington Russian espionage in the United States has become increasingly sophisticated and brazen, and American counterintelligence professionals are finding it difficult to contain it “after years’ worth of inattention” according to sources. According to Politico, Washington ignored Russian intelligence operations in the 1990s, believing that Moscow’s numerous domestic problems kept its attention away from America. But under Vladimir Putin, Russia rebuilt its espionage network in the US, to the point that now “Moscow’s espionage ground game [on American soil] is growing stronger and more brazen than ever”.

The news outlet cited “half a dozen current and former US intelligence officials”, who said that America has been “ignoring Russia for the last 15 years”. During that time, Washington focused much of its intelligence-related attention to the Middle East and Central Asia. But Russia used that opportunity to rebuild its espionage network on American soil. Currently, the Federal Bureau of Investigation —the US agency that is in charge of counterintelligence work— is finding it difficult to keep an eye on Russian espionage operations, partly because of the size of Russian operations. One US intelligence official told Politico that the Russians “have just got so many bodies” and are able to evade FBI surveillance.

It is now commonplace, say sources, for Russian “diplomats” to be found wandering around the US without permission from American authorities. Foreign diplomats are required to notify the US Department of State in advance each time they intend to travel more than 50 miles from their consular base, and the FBI must consent before permission to do so is granted. But the Russians are now routinely breaking this requirement; what is more, “half the time they’re never confronted” by the FBI, allegedly because Washington is does not wish to antagonize Moscow in light of the fragile state of affairs in Syria. One US intelligence official told Politico that the Russian “diplomats” appear to be secretly visiting locations across America “where underground fiber-optic cables tend to run”. They appear to be mapping the US telecommunications infrastructure, “perhaps preparing for an opportunity to disrupt it”, said the source.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 02 June 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with counterintelligence, espionage, News, Russia, United States

Ukraine raids Russian internet search engine company as part of ‘treason’ probe

May 31, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis Leave a comment

Yandex Ukrainian security service personnel raided the offices of a Russia-based internet search engine firm in two cities on Tuesday, as part of a treason investigation. The probe is reportedly related to the ongoing dispute between Kiev and Moscow, which intensified after 2014, when Russia unilaterally annexed the Russian district of Crimea. The Ukrainian government also accuses the Kremlin of clandestinely supporting pro-Russian insurgents in southeastern Ukraine, something that Moscow denies.

Earlier this month, Kiev announced that it would be blocking its citizens from using social media networks that are popular in Russia, including Yandex, a search engine that holds the lion’s share of the Russian internet usage market. The Ukrainian government argued that Russian social are were being used by Moscow to stir up pro-Russian sentiment and organize pro-Russian insurgents and activists inside Ukraine.

On Tuesday, members of Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) raided the offices of Yandex in the Ukrainian capital Kiev and in the city of Odessa, Ukraine’s third largest city, located on the Black Sea coast. The two locations that were raided by the SBU are registered as subsidiaries of Yandex, which is based in the Russian capital Moscow. In a statement issued on the same day, the SBU said that the simultaneous raids were part of a wider “treason probe”. The security service argues in the statement that Yandex had been found to be sharing the personal information of Ukrainian Internet users with the Russian intelligence services. The illegally shared information included the details of Ukrainian military personnel, said the SBU statement. In turn, Moscow used the data provided by Yandex to plan, organize and carry out “espionage, sabotage and subversive operations” in Ukraine, said the SBU.

Late on Tuesday, a statement issued by Yandex in Moscow confirmed the SBU raids and said it would cooperate with the investigation by the Ukrainian authorities. Meanwhile, Kiev has said that the ban on Russian social media and Internet search engines will remain active for at least three years.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 31 May 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with espionage, Internet, News, Russia, SBU (Ukraine), Ukraine, Yandex

Israel revises intel-sharing rules with US, after alleged disclosure to Russians

May 25, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 1 Comment

Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu Authorities in Israel have revised their intelligence-sharing protocols with the American government after it became known that United States President Donald Trump inadvertently exposed Israeli secrets to Russia. The alleged exposure of Israeli secrets came earlier this month, during a meeting between Mr. Trump and a delegation of Russian government officials, which included Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Sergey Kislyak, Moscow’s Ambassador to Washington.

During the meeting, the US President allegedly gave the two Russians details about plans by the Islamic State to smuggle explosives onboard airplanes, by hiding them inside laptop computers. However, according to reports in the American press, the information shared by Mr. Trump originated from Israel, which had voluntarily shared it with US intelligence. What is more, Tel Aviv had not authorized Washington to share the precise details behind this intelligence with other countries. Some reports in the US media suggest that Mr. Trump shared the Israeli-derived intelligence with the Russians in such a way as to expose ‘sources and methods’ —that is, the most sensitive aspects of the intelligence business, which intelligence agencies typically never disclose to adversaries. Additionally, even though the US president claims he never disclosed the source of the information, American media reports suggest that the Russians could easily determine that it came from Israel.

Israeli sources allegedly complained strongly to Washington, claiming that the intelligence shared by the US president “had put an [Israeli] agent’s life in peril”. Tel Aviv’s reaction appears to have been swift. On Wednesday, Israel’s Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said in an interview that Tel Aviv promptly “did our checks” and “clarified [things] with our friends in the United States”. Speaking to Israel Army Radio, the official radio station of the Israel Defense Forces, Mr. Liberman said that Israel had done “a spot repair”, prompting the Voice of America to claim that the Jewish state had altered its intelligence-sharing methods with the US. Liberman was asked by the Israel Army Radio to clarify, but refused to specify what changes had been made in the Israel-US intelligence-sharing arrangements. He only added that “there is [now] unprecedented intelligence cooperation with the United States”.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 25 May 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Avigdor Lieberman, intelligence cooperation, Israel, News, Russia, sources and methods, United States

Same hacker group is targeting French and German elections, says report

April 26, 2017 by Ian Allen Leave a comment

Konrad Adenauer Foundation The same group cyber-spies that attacked the campaign of French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron is now attacking German institutions that are connected to the country’s ruling coalition parties, according to a report by a leading cyber-security firm. The Tokyo-based security software company Trend Micro published a 41-page report on Tuesday, in which it tracks and traces the attacks against French and German political targets over the past two years. The report, entitled From Espionage to Cyber Propaganda: Pawn Storm’s Activities over the Past Two Years, concludes that the hackers are seeking to influence the results of the national elections in the European Union’s two most powerful nations, France and Germany.

The Trend Micro report focuses on a mysterious group that cyber-security experts have dubbed Pawn Storm —otherwise known as Sednit, Fancy Bear, APT28, Sofacy, and STRONTIUM. It says that the group has launched an aggressive phishing campaign against German political institutions, which has intensified in the past two months. The group allegedly set up fake computer servers in Germany and the Ukraine, and used them to try to infiltrate the computer networks of two elite German think-tanks, the Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAF) and the Friedrich Ebert Foundation (FEF). The KAF is connected with the Christian Democratic Union party, which is led by Germany’s Chancellor, Angela Merkel. The FEF has strong ties with the centrist Social Democratic Party, which is part of Germany’s governing alliance.

The report’s leading author, cyber-security expert Feike Hacquebord, told the Reuters news agency that the hackers were possibly seeking to infiltrate the two think-tanks as a means of gaining access to the two political parties that are connected with them. Some cyber-security experts in Europe and the United States have said that the Russian Main Intelligence Directorate, the country’s military intelligence agency, known as GRU, is behind the cyber-attacks on France, Germany and the United States. But the Trend Micro report did not attempt to place blame on Moscow or any other country for the cyber-attacks. The Kremlin has denied involvement with the alleged hacking operations.

► Author: Ian Allen | Date: 26 April 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with APT28, computer hacking, cyberespionage, cybersecurity, Fancy Bear, Feike Hacquebord, France, Germany, GRU, News, Russia, Sednit, Sofacy, STRONTIUM, Trend Micro

EU Council president grilled in closed-door probe of Polish-Russian spy deal

April 21, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 3 Comments

Senior European Union official Donald Tusk was grilled for several hours on Wednesday, in the context of a Polish government probe into an intelligence agreement between Warsaw and Moscow. But Tusk, who is the current president of the European Council, and served as Poland’s prime minister from 2007 to 2014, dismissed the probe as politicized and said it was deliberately designed to harm his political career. The investigation was launched by the government of Poland earlier this year. Its stated goal is to investigate an agreement that was struck in late 2013 between Poland’s Military Counterintelligence Service (MCS) and the Federal Security Service (FSB) of the Russian Federation. The agreement allegedly took place in secret, but was never implemented. The government of Poland canceled it in 2014, after accusing Moscow of illegally annexing the Ukrainian region of Crimea.

On Wednesday, Tusk spent nearly three hours at the office of the prosecutor in Warsaw, in a question-and-answer session that was held entirely behind closed doors. As he was leaving the building, the former Polish prime minister said he could not comment on the content of his testimony. But he used strong words to dismiss the entire investigation as “extremely political”, while accusing those behind it as holding a vendetta against him. Tusk and his supporters believe that the probe was primarily initiated by Jarosław Kaczyński, leader of the conservative Law and Justice party. They also claim that Kaczyński, who is Tusk’s political arch-foe in Poland, is spearheading a campaign of personal vindictiveness against him.

The rivalry between the two men began in 2010, when an airplane carrying a Polish government delegation to a World War II commemoration event in Russia crashed near the Russian city of Smolensk, killing everyone onboard. Among the dead was Polish President Lech Kaczyński, Jarosław Kaczyński’s brother. Since the air disaster, the leader of the Law and Justice party has maintained that the Russian government deliberately brought down the plane. He also accuses Tusk, who was Poland’s prime minister at the time, of colluding with Moscow to eliminate his brother. These allegations remain unsubstantiated, but they have contributed to the emergence of a venomous political climate in Poland that has dominated national politics for years.

On Wednesday, during Tusk’s three-hour testimony, several thousands of his supporters demonstrated outside the office of the prosecutor, urging Tusk to run for president in a few years. It is a common expectation in Poland that Tusk will soon turn his attention to domestic Polish politics and run for the highest office in the land in 2020.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 21 April 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with 2010 Smolensk air disaster, Donald Tusk, Jarosław Kaczyński, Lech Kaczynski, News, Poland, Russia

Mystery compound in Nicaragua shows Russia’s resurgence in Americas, say experts

April 10, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 2 Comments

GLONASS Managua A Russian facility built on a hillside facing the United States embassy in the Nicaraguan capital Managua is seen by some experts as symptomatic of Russia’s renewed presence in the Americas. The official Russian explanation for the heavily protected facility, which is surrounded by high walls, is that it is meant to operate as a tracking station for GLONASS, Russia’s version of the global positioning system (GPS). The Russians do not use GPS, because it is owned by the US government and operated by the US Air Force. But some believe that only part of the compound is dedicated to GLONASS activities, and that a major portion is a Russian listening base that sweeps US communications from throughout the region.

Nicaragua has a long Cold War legacy that culminated in the 1980s. In 1979, a leftist insurgency toppled the country’s longtime dictator, Anastazio Somoza. The rebels, who called themselves the Sandinista National Liberation Front (known widely as the Sandinistas), alarmed the government of US President Ronald Reagan. Consequently, the White House authorized a series of covert operations against Nicaragua’s leftist government. They centered on the Contras, an anti-communist counter-insurgency that was largely funded by Washington throughout the so-called Contra war that dominated the country’s politics in the 1980s. But the war also affected politics in the US, and almost toppled the Reagan administration when the Iran-Contra affair (illegal arms sales to Iran by the US government, which then used the proceeds to secretly fund the Contras) was revealed in the media.

In an article published last week, The Washington Post reported that, under the Presidency of Vladimir Putin, Russia has reemerged as a force in Latin American politics. Moscow now regularly supplies weapons to several countries in the hemisphere, including Ecuador, Peru, Argentina and Venezuela. It has also expanded its influence through the banking sector and via government loans in countries such as Brazil and Mexico. But Nicaragua, says The Post, has emerged as Russia’s closest ally in the region. For over a decade, the country’s political landscape has been dominated by the Sandinistas, who returned to power in 2006 and continue to govern the country today. The party was supported by the Soviet Union during the Cold War and thus retains strong historical links with Moscow. The Post reports that, according to some analysts, Russia seeks to cement its presence in America’s traditional backyard as a form of response to the eastward expansion of the US-led North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 10 April 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Analysis, Central America, global positioning system, GLONASS, Latin America, Managua (Nicaragua), Nicaragua, Russia, United States

US politics in uncharted waters as FBI announces probe into Russian activities

March 21, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 2 Comments

James Comey Monday’s official announcement that an investigation is underway into alleged Russian involvement in the 2016 United States presidential election was an important moment in American political history. It exposed the chaotic state of American politics and added yet another layer of complexity in an already intricate affair, from which the country’s institutions will find it difficult to recover for years to come. This is regardless of the outcome of the investigation, which is being conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Even if it fails to produce a ‘smoking gun’, the very fact that the country’s chief counterintelligence agency is examining the possibility that a US president was elected with help from Russia, is an astonishing development without parallel in modern American history.

It is important to recognize that the FBI would never have initiated such a controversial and politically charged investigation without having concrete proof of Russia’s interference in last year’s presidential election. No agency of the US federal government would choose to dedicate enormous resources and personnel, and risk the political fallout that such a probe inevitably entails, without first having amassed indisputable evidence that necessitates it. Moreover, the FBI is not acting alone; its investigation almost certainly encompasses and incorporates similar probes carried out by other American security agencies, and possibly by agencies in allied countries, including the United Kingdom. It follows that the FBI investigation will undoubtedly confirm the existence of a systematic Russian intelligence operation that was aimed at influencing the outcome of last year’s American election.

As the present author has previously stated, it would be “extremely unusual and highly uncharacteristic of Russian spy agencies if they did not launch at least a rudimentary covert campaign to target the 2016 US presidential election […]. Indeed, the opposite would have been strange”. The central question, of course, is: what types of activities were part of the Kremlin’s covert campaign? Did it mostly involve the methodical production and dissemination of so-called ‘fake news’? Did it involve substantial funding of individual candidates or political parties? Or were there perhaps instances of extortion and blackmail of targeted individuals? These questions must be answered in full, and their inherent complexity explains fully why the FBI Director James Comey would not discuss details of the investigation on Monday.

Crucially, the FBI probe will have to answer conclusively the question of whether members of the administration of US President Donald Trump, or indeed the president himself, were implicated in the Kremlin’s actions. Did the president and his senior campaign team know that the Kremlin was —allegedly—assisting their efforts? If so, how did they know? And if not, did they deliberately ignore concrete warnings pointing to the contrary?

Every American, regardless of political persuasion, who genuinely cares about his or her nation’s political stability, hopes that the FBI probe finds no collusion between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign. However, there is an important sense in which, no matter the outcome of the investigation, serious damage has already been done. The reputation of American political institutions as a whole has been severely shaken, and mistrust between American civil society and its political institutions continues to rise exponentially. Meanwhile, it is safe to say that it will take months for the FBI’s probe to conclude. By then, the current chaotic state of American politics could be the a new permanently reality in Washington, a city that has witnessed much tumult in its history, though perhaps never as perplexing as the current crisis.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 21 March 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with 2016 US presidential election, Analysis, Donald Trump, FBI, James B. Comey, Joseph Fitsanakis, Russia, United States

Russian special forces troops seen in Egypt and Libya, say reports

March 16, 2017 by Joseph Fitsanakis 1 Comment

Khalifa Haftar Russia may have become the latest country to deploy special forces soldiers in Libya, according to news reports citing anonymous United States officials. Late on Tuesday, the Reuters news agency reported that Russian special forces troops had been seen on the border between Libya and Egypt. The news agency said that the information came from “two US officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity”. The same article cited unnamed “Egyptian security forces”, who said that a 22-member Russian paramilitary team had set up an operations base in the Egyptian town of Sidi Barrani, which is located 60 miles from Libyan territory.

Libya has descended into a state of complete anarchy since the demise of the country’s dictator, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. The Libyan strongman was killed in 2011, as a result of a popular uprising backed by Western powers and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Arguably the strongest faction in the ongoing Libyan Civil War is the so-called Tobruk-led Government, which is affiliated with the Libyan National Army. The commander of the Libyan National Army is Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, an old adversary of Colonel Gaddafi, who lived in the US under Washington’s protection for many decades before returning to Libya in 2011 to participate in the war. The Tobruk-led Government is ostensibly supported by the US. However, its military wing, led by Haftar, operates semi-autonomously, and some believe that Haftar has aspirations to lead his own armed faction in Libya. Last November, Haftar visited Moscow, where he met with senior government officials, including Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. There are reports that the Russian special forces troops alleged seen in Egypt are operating in support of Haftar.

Earlier this week, a spokesman for the Tobruk-led government told Russian media that Moscow had promised to provide it with funding and military aid. Earlier this year, it was confirmed that a number of Russian private security contractors were in Libya and were providing services to Haftar’s militias. But there are no confirmed reports of the presence of Russian government troops on the ground in Libya. On Tuesday, Moscow denied the Reuters report and accused “certain Western mass media” of “spreading false information from anonymous sources” in order to “smear Russia”.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 16 March 2017 | Permalink

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with 2011 Libyan civil war, Khalifa Haftar, Libya, Libyan National Army, News, Russia

Russia possibly tried to kill Montenegro PM, says British foreign secretary

March 13, 2017 by Ian Allen 1 Comment

Boris Johson Boris Johnson, the British foreign secretary has said in an interview that Russian spies may have orchestrated last year’s failed attempt to kill the then-prime minister of Montenegro, Milo Dukanović. Mr. Johnson, a senior figure in the Conservative Party of the United Kingdom, was a major contender for the prime minister’s position in 2016, after the administration of David Cameron collapsed under the weight of the Brexit vote result. Speaking on Sunday morning to reporter Robert Peston, of Britain’s ITV television network, Mr. Johnson said that the West should “engage” with Russia, but warned that it should also “beware” of Moscow’s “dirty tricks” in Europe and the United States.

The British foreign secretary spoke following reports that British intelligence services called an emergency meeting with representatives of the country’s major political parties, in order to warn them that Russia planned to use cyber-attacks to disrupt regional and national elections in the country. Mr. Johnson said that the government had “no evidence the Russians are actually involved in trying to undermine our democratic processes at the moment”. But he added that there was “plenty of evidence that the Russians are capable of doing that. And there is no doubt”, he went on, “that they’ve been up to all sorts of dirty tricks”. Some of those “dirty tricks”, said Mr. Johnson, targeted the former Yugoslav Republic of Montenegro, where last year there was “an attempted coup and possibly an attempted assassination”.

The British politician was referring to allegations made last October by authorities in Montenegro that “nationalists from Russia” and Serbia were behind a failed plot to kill the country’s then-Prime Minister Milo Dukanović and spark a pro-Russian coup in the country. The allegations surfaced after 20 Serbians and Montenegrins were arrested by police in Montenegro for allegedly planning a military coup against the government. The arrests took place on election day, October 16, as Montenegrins were voting across the Balkan country of 650,000 people. The plotters had allegedly hired a “long-distance sharpshooter” who was “a professional killer” for the task of killing Đukanović. After killing the Prime Minister, the plotters planned to storm the parliament and prompt a pro-Russian coup in Montenegro, according to authorities. In response to allegations that the coup had been hatched in neighboring Serbia, Serbian Prime Minister Vučić said that he would not allow Serbia to “act as the puppet of world powers”, a comment that was clearly directed at Moscow. Russia vehemently denied the allegations.

Meanwhile, Mr. Johnson is preparing to visit Moscow in a few days to meet with his Russian counterpart, Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov. He told ITV that he planned to deliver his “personal feeling” to Mr. Lavrov, which “is one of deep, deep sadness” about Russia’s foreign policy under President Vladimir Putin.

► Author: Ian Allen | Date: 13 March 2017 | Permalink