Poland charges 16 suspects with spying for Russia
Wesprzyj naszą pracę na Go Fund Me. Dziękujemy!Poland’s National Public Prosecutor’s Office has filed court charges against 16 individuals suspected of spying for Russia.
Photo:PAP/Leszek Szymański
The 16 suspects, who are nationals of other Eastern European countries, face up to 10 years in prison if convicted, public broadcaster Polish Radio’s IAR news agency reported on Wednesday.
They will be tried before the district court in the eastern Polish city of Lublin, it said.
According to Poland’s Internal Security Agency (ABW), they carried out espionage and propaganda activities for Russia’s security services, as well as preparing acts of sabotage.
The spy network conducted reconnaissance and surveillance of Poland’s critical infrastructure, such as seaports and military facilities, including in Warsaw, Rzeszów and Przemyśl, prosecutors have said.
The suspects passed information to their Russian handlers, for which they received payments, the IAR news agency reported.
The Lublin court has ordered that 15 of the 16 suspects be placed under temporary detention, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
They have been charged with „acting on behalf of a foreign intelligence service against the interests of Poland,” and face a prison sentence of up to 10 years, the National Public Prosecutor’s Office said.
Stanisław Żaryn, Poland’s deputy minister for the security services, told reporters on Wednesday that dismantling the Russian spy network represented „a significant success” as the group had posed „a serious threat.”
Żaryn added that „Polish counterintelligence agencies are constantly taking measures to identify hostile activity carried out by Russian and Belarusian services.”
(pm/gs)
Source: IAR, PAP
