Russia accused the United States on Tuesday of resorting to Cold War tactics. In its most vehement response so far Moscow said the arrest of 11 alleged Russian spies was a deliberate attempt to undermine the recent improvement in US-Russian ties.
“We believe such actions are ungrounded and have unseemly goals,” Andrei Nesterenko, the Russian foreign ministry spokesperson, said. “We do not understand the reasons the US department of justice has made a public statement in the spirit of the Cold War.”
Five of the suspects appeared in a Manhattan federal court briefly on Monday, where a judge ordered them to remain in prison until the preliminary hearing on July 27.
Ten suspects were arrested in the US. An 11th man was arrested and released on bail in Cyprus.
The FBI said the deep-cover agents were called “illegals” by Moscow and that they adopted Americanised names as part of their efforts to blend in and make connections to think-tanks and government officials.
Russia’s Sluzhbar Vneshny Razvedki (SVR) foreign intelligence agency was tight-lipped about the arrests. “We refuse to comment on these reports,” the agency’s spokesperson, Sergei Ivanov, said.
But in an indictment that might have been taken from the plot of a Cold War thriller, the FBI alleged that the SVR sent spies to live in the US under false names, with the intention of becoming so Americanised they could build relationships with sources and gather information without raising suspicion. Some of the agents lived as married couples and had children who have grown up as Americans, unaware that their parents are Russian.
The FBI alleges the accused spies were able to get close to a scientist working with “bunker-buster” nuclear bombs and a New York financier with powerful political ties. But the intercepts do not suggest they were successful at uncovering valuable information and some of the exchanges with Moscow appear almost laughable in their simplicity, including advice to one agent to “build up, little by little, relations” with the financier.
The arrests follow repaired relations between Washington and Moscow, which had soured during the Bush era, and come just days after a successful visit by Russia’s president, Dmitry Medvedev, to the US.
The Kremlin will now weigh its response. Hardliners will call for punitive measures, including tit-for-tat expulsions, but more pragmatic voices will hope the episode can be ignored and quickly forgotten.
The suspects include a couple known as Richard and Cynthia Murphy, who were arrested in New Jersey, Vicky Pelaez and a man who went by the name of Juan Lazaro, who were arrested in Yonkers, New York state, and Anna Chapman, who was arrested in Manhattan.
Another three — Mikhail Semenko and a couple operating under the names Michael Zottoli and Patricia Mills — appeared in a court in Alexandria, Virginia, after being arrested in Arlington, close to the Pentagon and CIA headquarters.
A couple, called Donald Howard Heathfield and Tracey Lee Ann Foley, were arrested in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Reuters reported that an 11th alleged spy, a man operating under the name of Robert Christopher Metsos and accused of organising the financing of the group, was arrested at Cyprus’s Larnaca airport as he tried to leave the island for Budapest.
An intercepted message from the SVR to two of the alleged spies outlined their mission: “You were sent to USA for long-term service trip. Your education, your bank accounts, car, house, etc — all these serve one goal: fulfil your main mission, that is to search and develop ties in policymaking circles in US and send intels [intelligence reports] to C [Centre],” according to the indictment.
The FBI described the “illegals” as being paired in Russia “so that they can live together and work together in a host country, under the guise of a married couple. Illegals who are placed together and cohabit in the country to which they are assigned will often have children together.”
According to the indictment, members of the spy ring reported back to Moscow in 2004 that they were able to get close to an American who the Russian agents described as involved in “strategic planning related to nuclear weapon development” and “had conversations with him about research programmes on small-yield high-penetration nuclear [‘bunker-buster’] warheads recently authorised by US Congress”.
One of the alleged spies, named as Cynthia Murphy, built a relationship with a man described as a prominent New York-based financier active in politics. Moscow responded that he was a very interesting target because he might be able to provide Âinformation about foreign policy and discussions among the president’s closest aides.
The SVR also urged its agents to collect information on US positions on arms talks, Iran’s nuclear programme and Afghanistan in advance of US President Barack Obama’s visit to Russia last year.
The indictment says the alleged spies used a number of methods to communicate with the SVR, including unique wireless networks to transfer encrypted data.
Other information was passed by posting pictures on the internet that had text buried in them, as well as long established techniques such as drops and “brush pasts” in local parks.
Each of the 10 people arrested in the US has been charged with conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government. They face up to five years in prison if convicted, although it is possible that more serious charges will be added.
The alleged spies are also accused of money laundering. —