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After the arrest, more than a month ago, of an agent of the German secret services (Bnd) accused of spying for Russia, now it has been the turn of one of his alleged accomplices. The article by Pierluigi Mennitti from Berlin
The circle is tightening around the network of German spies who for years have worked in the shadows, and in the jagged folds of the secret services of the Bundesrepublik, for the benefit of Putin's intelligence. After the arrest over a month ago of an employee of the Federal Intelligence Service (BND) for spying for Russia, one of his alleged accomplices has now also ended up in the shirts of the German police.
WHO IS THE NEW SUSPECT
This is Arthur E., a German citizen, not an employee of the BND, arrested last Sunday (January 22) at Munich airport upon his arrival from the United States. According to the federal attorney general who oversees the investigation, the man is suspected of having brought secret information stolen from BND employee Carsten L. to Russia and handed it over to an intelligence service of that country. Carsten L., and was arrested in Berlin on December 21st on suspicion of treason.
The investigation was conducted in close cooperation with the BND and with the support of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). The accused was brought before the investigating judge of the federal court already on Monday. The judge ordered remand.
NEW DETAILS ON THE CARSTEN L CASE.
In the meantime, the details that have emerged on the figure of Carsten L. from the ongoing investigations underline the delicate role he had covered within the German security service. The man was responsible for the security check of German agents, in fact a mole who was supposed to hunt down moles. Assignment to which he had been called recently, after having worked as head of unit in the "Technical Reconnaissance" department. All the security screenings of BND employees and candidates passed through him and the suspicion is that he was able to share the most intimate knowledge of hundreds of BND employees with his second employers in Moscow.
THE TIPS TO THE GERMAN SECRET SERVICES
On his trail the German secret services were directed by a tip from a foreign intelligence service. And when the investigators guessed the caliber of the arrested person, sweeping investigations started. At that point the suspect's apartment and also two BND properties were searched. Justice Minister Marco Buschmann had already spoken in December of a major coup against Russian espionage, if the suspicions were confirmed. And BND chairman Bruno Kahl had announced that, after becoming aware of the possible case of suspicion within his own ranks, extensive internal investigations had been immediately launched. And when the investigations confirmed the suspicions, the ball went to the federal prosecutor's office.
For the federal secret services, the story is highly explosive: during the war of Russian aggression in Ukraine, a Russian spy is unmasked in its ranks. Thus the pressure from the political world on the BND has increased, as has the awareness that Berlin (and Germany) has not ceased to be a crossroads for spies with the end of the Cold War and the fall of the Wall. Indeed, the former city divided on the front of the East-West conflict remains a coveted square, both for industrial espionage and for the more traditional, more political one. And the rekindling of the conflict in Eastern Europe, with the return of the Cold War winds, only brings it back to the center of interest.
When the case came to light, BND chairman Kahl stressed that restraint and discretion were very important in investigating the matter. With Russia we are dealing with an actor on the other side "whose ruthlessness and willingness to use violence we have to reckon with", he said verbatim, "every detail of the case that becomes public would be an advantage for this adversary with the intention to harm Germany”.
PREVIOUS
The last time a so-called mole or double agent of the BND had been unmasked was in 2014. But – as a partial consolation – it was "friendly fire". At the end of a two-year investigation, the Munich Higher Court sentenced a 32-year-old to eight years in prison for treason and breach of official secrecy, mainly in favor of the CIA. Between 2008 and 2014, the trained clerk had passed more than 200 BND documents, some of them top secret or explosives, to the CIA for at least 80,000 euros.
Now is the time for the Russian front, particularly delicate also because in recent years Germany has been visibly a hunting ground for agents from Moscow, and Berlin itself the scene of attacks whose Russian origin has been ascertained. What has changed today is precisely the relationship between Berlin and Moscow.
WHAT HAPPENS NOW
With the second arrest, investigators from the Attorney General's Office and the Federal Criminal Police Office now have the opportunity to clarify the case as much as possible, starting with the reconstruction of the steps that allowed the material allegedly organized by Carsten L. to di get to Russia. Now it might even be possible to clarify one of the major inconsistencies in the case: Carsten L's motive. According to information in the possession of the weekly Der Spiegel , there are more and more indications that money is at stake. The magazine also reports rumors from uncited sources that the double agent was increasingly frustrated with his employer and had developed a certain sympathy for the nationalist AfD party.
Jurists point out that, according to the penal code, in particularly serious cases, treason can be punished with a prison sentence of at least five years or even life imprisonment. This is the case, for example, if the offender has abused a position of responsibility which places him under a special obligation to protect state secrets.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/scandalo-germania-servizi-segreti-bnd/ on Fri, 27 Jan 2023 09:58:41 +0000.