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Russia and the US are facing their most serious diplomatic crisis of the Obama
era after the Kremlin angrily denounced the arrest of 10 US-based Russian
spies and said the FBI operation to apprehend them was an unsavoury cold war
plot.
The alleged spies are in US custody, after being charged in court on Monday,
June 28 with conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government. Police in
Cyprus arrested the ring's alleged paymaster and 11th spy, Christopher
Metsos, at Lanarca airport. Metsos was attempting to catch a morning flight to
Budapest in Hungary, they said.
A district court in Lanarca later released Metsos on bail for €20,000 (£16,000),
prompting fears he would flee to the Turkish-run north of the island, or take a
boat to nearby Turkey or Syria. Greek police said they were dumbfounded by
the court's decision. "It's not what we expected," said police spokesman Michalis
Michael, adding that they were seeking more documents from the US and would
go back to court.
Russia's foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, questioned the timing of the arrests in
the US, which came just three days after Barack Obama hosted Russia's
president, Dmitry Medvedev, on a successful US visit, which included talks in
Washington, a joint presidential cheeseburger and a tour of Silicon Valley.
"The moment when all this was done was chosen quite smartly," Lavrov said. In
a statement, Russia's foreign ministry described the arrests as "groundless"
and "unseemly", and suggested they were a shadowy attempt to undermine the
recent "reset" in US-Russian relations "announced by the US administration". It
said the suspects were Russian citizens who had never acted against US
interests.
President Obama declined to comment on the case when asked about the
alleged spies during a briefing with reporters on the economy.
The diplomatic scandal spread to Britain after it emerged that one of the 11
alleged spies involved in the "long-term deep cover" espionage ring had used a
fake British passport. According to US court documents, Tracey Lee Ann Foley
travelled on a fraudulent British passport prepared by the SVR, Russia's foreign
intelligence agency.
Foley was given the passport in Vienna en route to Moscow, the FBI indictment
said. Another Russian spy, Richard Murphy, picked up a fake Irish passport at a
"brush past" meeting with a Russian agent in Rome. He then used it to travel to
Moscow.
A Foreign Office spokeswoman said: "We are aware that the indictments state
that one of the accused has travelled on a UK passport. We will be investigating
this fully with the US. We are establishing the facts so it would be wrong to
comment further at this stage. We remain confident that the British passport is
one of the most secure documents of its kind – fully meeting rigorous
international standards."
There was no indication whether the passport used the identity of a genuine UK
national, as happened in a case earlier this year that severely tested relations
between Britain and Israel.
The spy scandal places Medvedev in one of the most uncomfortable dilemmas
of his two-year presidency. He now has to weigh up the Kremlin's response –
and whether to expel or even arrest Americans living in Russia. Relations
between Washington and Moscow have improved significantly since the semi-
cold war days of the Bush era, with both Obama and Medvedev investing
heavily in their personal friendship – and there have been results: a new, if
modest, Start treaty on nuclear arms reduction; a deal on civilian nuclear
cooperation; the US has backed Russia's long-delayed WTO application and
Russia has taken a tougher line on Iran.
The Russian foreign ministry said: "We are counting on the American side to
display the appropriate understanding in this matter, including taking into
account the positive character of the current stage of Russian-American
relations."
A 55-page US dossier reveals in humiliating detail the frequently amateurish
and bungling behaviour of Moscow's agents – who lived in leafy suburban
homes in Boston, New York and Washington DC.
The FBI said the spies were urged to adopt Americanised names to blend in,
and ferret out information from thinktanks and government officials.
Far from staying hidden, however, the FBI appears to have known about the
espionage ring since at least 2000, and tracked its every move.BI agents
secretly FBI observed numerous encounters
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