REVIEW TOPICS:
Russian security services revealed foreign spies at MAKS-2009 airspace show
Russia eager to declassify selected documents on Polish leadership’s secret negotiations on eve of WWII
Only Russian Federal Security Service possess full information on freighter Arctic Sea
News of Arctic Sea crew detention in investigation ward denied, suspicious cargo not yet reveal on vessel’s board
Russian allegations on participation of Ukraine in aggression in Caucasus are lies: SBU
Citizen of Sri Lanka failed to buy Russian FSB officer in attempt to provide illegal border crossing by citizens of India
Rakhat Aliyev's people are to be blamed for assassination attempts, former Kazakhstan’s KNB head says
Latest scandal in Romania prompted by military intelligence against President Basescu, according to media
Georgian politicians and analysts expecting parliamentary debate on lustration draft bill
Russian security services revealed foreign spies at MAKS-2009 airspace show
MAKS 2009 aviation and space show in Moscow suburb has ended with an espionage scandal, online paper Life.ru reports. Before closing of the show in the territory of Zhukovsky airfield
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| Glimpse from MAKS-2009 |
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confidential for visitors the secret services have detained two citizens of the Netherlands. This is already the second such incident such at MAKS airspace shows for the last few years, Life.ru adds.
As it became known to the online paper from sources in Russian law enforcement bodies, the tourists from Holland have "casually” entered a confidential hangar. As Zhukovsky is a military airfield, all premises there are confidential, according to the source of Life.ru. Exhibition halls were allocated specially for the MAKS-2009 airspace show. The remained hangars have remained the secret technical zones. The two Dutchmen got into one of such confidential hangars. The rapid reaction group detained infringers and delivered them to the operative staff.
At the check the citizens of the Netherlands have produced the documents certifying that they are employees of an Internet edition, 4 Airplans, which specializes in planes. They explained that they have noticed from the accessible territory the planes which have been not intended for display (there are many airplanes in the closed premises) and have decided to take pictures there.
According to the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), the two infringers have already been noticed at an air show in Zhukovky last year. To avoid a scandal all the pictures made in the technical zone were removed from the cameras. The two Dutchmen were sent away and warned about the rules of behaviour. They may face problems with obtaining the Russian visa next time, Life.ru marks.
Russia eager to declassify selected documents on Polish leadership’s secret negotiations on eve of WWII
The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) have declassified the documents telling about secrets of the Polish politics in 1935-1945, including negotiations of high-ranking Foreign Ministry officials, members of the Defence Ministry and secret services of Poland, news agency RIA Novosti reports, referring to the chief of the SVR public relations and mass media bureau Sergei Ivanov.
The Foreign Intelligence Service has said it will present declassified documents, contained in collection of archival materials, The Secrets of Polish politics. 1935-1945. «The collection of documents from the Russian intelligence archive includes analytical reviews of foreign and domestic policy of Poland, political letters and records of conversations of ambassadors, reports of military attaches, a selection of information telegrams of the Polish diplomatic missions and other materials in which it is told about the secret plans of Poland before the war», stated Ivanov.
According to him, the declassified documents will help historians and public figures, as well as the wide public to answer such questions as: could the questions of collective security find the decision before intrusion of German troops in Poland; why it has not occurred; what did prevent taking by the political leaders of that time all necessary measures for formation of an anti-Nazi coalition.
Ivanov also emphasized that probably not all the secrets of the Polish politics in prewar years would be revealed, «but the view on the world through the eyes of high-ranking employees of Poland’s Foreign Ministry, Defence Ministry and secret services of this country will be useful to responsible treatment of the events connected with the beginning of the WWII».
The documents will be presented in the press centre of news agency RIA Novosti on August, 31. Participation of the collection’s editor, SVR Major-General Leo Sotskov is expected.
Only Russian Federal Security Service possess full information on freighter Arctic Sea
The new biography facts of the arrested alleged hijackers of freigher the Arctic Sea emerge, daily Moskovsky Komsomolets (MK) reports. The paper says the 31 y.o. Yevgeny Mironov from Tallinn, Estonia, only this spring has left the prison where he spent four years for unintentional murder in a bar where he worked as a security guard.
An Estonian online forum’s user has given description of his friends, Andrey Lunyov and Alexey Andryushin. Lunyov is a sailor and in the past he has been a hostage of pirates therefore perfectly understands how such an affair can end. Probably, someone has employed the deceived young people by promising big money and then there was already late to change something. Andryushin, leaving his previous work in July, has told that he is leaving for Russia to work in construction.
While all attention of media is aimed at the sailors and alleged hijackers of the freighter who are in Moscow, the cargo ship itself has disappeared again, MK writes today, reminding that the captain and three crew members remained on its board. It is strange why the sailors till now have not allowed to contact their relatives, the paper marks. Moreover, the owner of the vessel does not know exactly where there is the freighter and when the sailors who have remained on it will return home. The full information is possessed only by the FSB, MK points out.
Meanwhile the online paper Dni.ru writes that the cargo ship has illegally transported weapons. It alleges that the group of arrested "pirates" has been ostensibly employed by a secret service of one of the European Union countries. The actions of the Russian Armed Forces regarding the Arctic Sea can be the additional certificate of "something important and valuable" on its board, online paper marks. It notes that even the spetsnaz special-task troops were involved in the operation of the General Staff’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU). The paper’s conclusion is that illegal arms were on board the cargo vessel, however it is not known to whom they belonged and what was the real destination.
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Arctic Sea crew delivered from vessel |
And the hijackers most likely were used "blindly", they knew only that they need to seize the vessel and to deliver it to a certain point, writes Moskovsky Komsomolets.
News of Arctic Sea crew detention in investigation ward denied, suspicious cargo not yet reveal on vessel’s board
The Federal Penitentiary Service (FPS) of Russia has denied a mass media report that crew members of the Arctic Sea dry cargo ship, on being freed from the hijackers’ detention, are held in the Lefortovo investigation ward in Moscow, news agency ITAR-TASS reports, referring to a FPS spokesman. He said investigation FPS ward-2, just as any other investigation ward in Russia, holds persons only on court ruling.
The Federal Penitentiary Service did not specify the whereabouts of 11 crew members of the Arctic Sea taken to Moscow, ITAR-TASS adds. According to some media outlets, the Russian secret services have been hiding the crew members of of the Arctic Sea in one of Moscow hotels, AIA reported yesterday.
eanwhile the Russian Foreign Ministry stated in a commentary today that no suspicious cargo had been revealed on board of the Arctic Sea as far, news agency Interfax reports. More thorough probe is to be carried out at one of the next ports, the Russian Foreign Ministry marks.
Allegations on participation of Ukraine in aggression in Caucasus are lies: SBU
The chairman of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) Valentin Nalyvaychenko denies participation of the Ukrainian militaries in the last year’s warfare in South Ossetia, Russian News Service reports today.
«Ukraine was not and is not a party of this conflict. We are not an aggressor in this situation,” the SBU head stated. «Therefore we do not require any comments concerning those or other statements as they are false», Nalyvaychenko stressed.
On August 24, the Investigative Committee of General Prosecutor’s Office of the Russian Federation declared that servicemen of regular divisions of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine and the Ukrainian nationalists had participated in an assault on Tskihinval, South Ossetia, (in 2008) and there were material evidence of this participation.
The Ukrainian military command has named this statement a provocation. «It is propaganda. Our military units were not there», the head of the press service of the Ukrainian General Staff Sergei Kuzmin announced today. The Ukrainian nationalists also have denied the Russian Investigative Committee’s allegations.
Citizen of Sri Lanka failed to buy Russian FSB officer in attempt to provide illegal border crossing by citizens of India
The St.Petersburg Investigatory directorate of the Russian Federation General Prosecutor’s Office brought a criminal case concerning a citizen of Sri Lanka on the fact of attempt to bribe a Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) official, news agency Interfax reports, referring to the online site of the directorate.
The citizen of Sri Lanka, Shahulu Hamidu Mohammed Shamazu, is charged that on August 5, he tried to bribe an operative of the intelligence department of the St.Petersburg and Leningrad region Border Guard directorate of the FSB of the Russian Federation, proposing 15,000 roubles for providing unobstructed crossing of the state border by a group of citizens of India.
However, as the Investigatory directorate emphasizes, the FSB employee has refused to accept the bribe, Interfax adds.
Rakhat Aliyev's people are to be blamed for assassination attempts, former Kazakhstan’s KNB head says
The former chairman of the National Security Committee (KNB) of Kazakhstan Alnur Musayev declared that all the previous assassination attempts against him and attempts of abductions in Vienna had been connected with Rakhat Aliyev, the former ambassador of Kazakhstan to Austria
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| Rakhat Aliyev, Alnur Musayev |
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and the ex-son-in-law of Kazakhstan’s President, not with the secret services of Kazakhstan, news agency KazTAG reports, referring to he Austrian newspaper Krone Zeitung.
Musayev considers the reason of the attempts is that he knows who exactly has committed the crime against former top-managers of Nurbank, Aybar Khasenov and Zholdas Timraliyev. Musayev alleges that the crimes were performed on Aliyev’s order. He says he also knows about other crimes connected with Aliyev, including other abductions and murders, however, it has been for long time kept secret in Kazakhstan because of Aliyev's position as the son-in-law of the President.
Answering the question of the Krone Zeitung what has made him to tell about that especially on the eve of parliamentary commission’s session which on August 26 will consider the case of Aliyev, Musayev explained that that he felt «moral responsibility and duty». He also marked that Aliyev was obliged for his stay in Austria and political asylum to "earlier adjusted political contacts» in Vienna, especially with the former leadership of the Foreign Ministry of Austria..
Meanwhile, according to Krone Zeitung, these days the State Office of General Prosecutor of Kazakhstan has addressed to the Ministry of Justice of Austria informing on «response of inquiry on extradition of the citizen of Kazakhstan A.Musayev».
Both of former confidants of President Nursultan Nazarbaev, Rakhat Aliyev and A.Musayev, in 2007 became sharp critics of the regime and have been living in Vienna, having received the status of political refugees. The secret services of Kazakhstan have repeatedly undertaken measures with the purpose of „neutralization" of enemies of the President.
On March 26, 2008, the former KNB head and the ex-son-in-law of the President of Kazakhstan were tried in absentia and sentenced to twenty years of imprisonment each. Aliyev and Musayev were accused of attempts of violent seizure of state power, creation and management of an organized criminal group, illegal reception and disclosure of the state secrets, plunder of fire-arms and an ammunition, abusing of authority and service position, plunder of state property in the large amount. Musayev was recognized also guilty of treason in the form of espionage. Both were deprived of awards and ranks.
Even earlier, on January 15, Almalyn district court of Alma-Ata sentenced Rakhat Aliyev, accused of abduction of top-managers of Nurbank, and also of raider attacks, to 20 years of imprisonment with confiscation of property, without the right to occupy the state posts and to carry out banking activity for three years. At the same trial, Musayev as an accomplice of Aliyev, was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment with confiscation of property.
On September 25, 2008, it was reported in mass media that an assassination attempt had taken place in Austria against Musayev and Aliyev. According one of the versions, the target of the attack was Aliyev. According to preliminary information, Aliyev was easily wounded, and Musayev was delivered to hospital with heavy injury.
However, subsequently this information has not proved to be true. The representative of the Austrian Office of Public Prosecutor Gerhard Jaroshl declared that Musayev himself reported to the police on the attempt. According to later reports, Aliyev was not accompanying Musayev then. At the same time it became known that attackers had wounded the interpreter of the former KNB head, a citizen of Austria Lidia Aikmeijer.
Musayev, in an interview to The Wall Street Journal on September 25, 2008, told that he was attacked by four persons armed with pistols. He said that he had showed resistance to them, the fight had drawn attention of passers-by and the attackers had run away. The interpreter told the newspaper about the same.
According to the former KNB chairman, in July, 2008, several Russian speaking persons already tried to kidnap him trying to jostle him into a vehicle in one of Vienna streets.
Latest scandal in Romania prompted by military intelligence against President Basescu, according to media
The central dailies of Romania have come with disclosures about the affair involving the brother of President Traian Basescu and about others who are involved in it. The daily Bursa says that the former director from the Ministry of Economy, Aurel Cazacu, had been surveyed since 2006 by the Division of Military Security under the suspicion of favouring foreign interests in the military industry and damaging in this way the Romanian state. This was confirmed some time ago, as Evenimentul Zilei published an article last year in which it showed that Cazacu had allegedly met several times with persons from several countries, in the attempt to facilitate some affairs with arms, an example being some business opportunities with Jordan, launched by Cazacu together with Marius Medeleanu, a former political attaché at the Embassy of Romania in Jordan.
The journalists of daily Gardianul write that the target of Aurel Cazacu has been for some time the brokerage in the trade with cars, industrial equipment, ships and aircrafts, and also consultancy activities for business and management, although he held a strategic position for the national production of the defence industry.
Journalist Sorin Rosca Stanescu from daily Gandul writes on his own blog that the brother of the President of Romania participated in a highly classified operation of international trafficking of important quantities of explosives. According to his source, five ships with explosives and ammunitions which arrived from Thailand were anchored in the port of Constanta, the operation being managed by Mircea Basescu, who assured also the secret re-exporting of the explosives to a military unit from Valcea County.
The Ministry of Defence of Romania yesterday denied any involvement between them and Desintco company connected with Mircea Basescu. The intelligence service of the ministry said in a press release it held no information about Desintco’s setting up. According to the scenarios in Romania’s newspapers, the scandal seems to have been prompted by the military intelligence services against President Traian Basescu, Nine O’Clock concludes. Antena 3 considers the hypothesis that Traian Basescu was informed about the deals of his brother, but preferred to deny this in front of the public opinion.
Georgian politicians and analysts expecting parliamentary debate on lustration draft bill
Georgian parliament member Gia Tortladze has worked out a lustration draft law and says he would present the draft in September after parliament returns from its summer recess, The Georgian Times reports. Tortladze’s proposal is that former KGB employees and Communist party officials should be prevented from holding senior public positions. This restriction would extend to all those who worked in Soviet agencies between February 25, 1921 to April 9, 1991, online paper expands.
Tortladze’s draft bill will also require the President of Georgia to create a State Commission, composed of Interior Ministry officials and parliamentary faction representatives, to gather information about those who secretly collaborated with the Soviet KGB. The Commission would collect information about those people who admit their former connections with the KGB on a voluntarily basis. Those who do not admit such connections voluntarily within 6 months will find their names published in a special report if these connections are discovered. The bill also requires that any former spies currently working in high-ranking public posts must resign within a month or their names will also be made public, The Georgian Times adds.
The bill now proposed by Tortladze is similar to one tabled by the opposition Democratic Front faction more than two years ago in the previous parliament, online paper continues. This faction, which mainly consisted of members of the Republican and Conservative parties, also included Tortladze. This draft law, which was thought to be somewhat tolerant as it did not require the Government to name names was rejected by the ruling National Movement in February, 2007. In 2004, government led by late Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania signed a document, 10 Steps to Independence, one of which was passing a law on lustration. But the parliamentary majority didn’t have a unified position on this issue.
Some analysts and politicians are slamming Tortladze for having failed to clearly formulate whom the draft law will punish, The Georgian Times marks. Political analyst Kakha Katsitadze wonders what will happen with the President of Georgia who served as a soldier of the Soviet Border Guard troops under KGB if the proposal of lustration law would be adopted.
The analysts note that whether the bill is good or not it will be passed if the authorities want it to be. It will be discussed in Parliament in its autumn session and is expected to generate another round of heated debates.
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