Russia intends to return its spies to Europe through the supply of weapons to Ukraine - Politico
According to journalists, the Kremlin is beginning to come after the mass expulsion of Russian intelligence staff from Europe, which occurred in 2022 against the background of a full -scale war in Ukraine. They all worked under diplomatic cover. Now the Russian authorities are going to make a new attempt to revive the spy network in the continent. Interestingly, they are primarily interested in critical infrastructure.
In this way, spies will be instructed to monitor the state of production and supply of Western weapons to Ukraine. According to the head of the British Mi5 Security Service, Ken McCallum, it is the "most significant strategic blow" on the Kremlin in a new history of intelligence, because with the outbreak of war in Ukraine more than 400 spies of the Russian Federation from all over Europe have returned to their homeland.
This greatly reduced their sphere of influence and the possibilities of espionage. The same result was noted in the Security Service and Intelligence of Finland - the opportunity to conduct intelligence operations in the country was actually nullified. "The Russian reconnaissance base last year has decreased approximately twice compared to the former size.
Although Russia is still trying to place reconnaissance officers under diplomatic cover, it will have to find ways to compensate for the lack of intelligence data, for example, more and more by other forms of secret operations," - said the head of Finland of Finland Anti Peltari.
In an interview, the director of the Lithuanian State Security Department of Lithuania, in an interview with the publication, noted that new methods of collecting intelligence data were studied in the Kremlin, namely: cybernetic, traditional cover, as well as online operations. Moreover, they even seek the help of Lithuanian citizens who visit the Russian Federation or Belarus.