Report: Russia hopes to swap spies with the West
Source: AFP |
July 16, 2013, Tuesday
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MOSCOW wants to exchange two Russian spies who are married and were jailed this month in Germany for at least one convict jailed in Russia on charges of spying for the West, a report said yesterday.
Russia's Kommersant newspaper said that the Russian secret services wanted to bring the pair - known only by their code names Andreas and Heidrun Anschlag - home to Russia after decades as "sleepers" in Germany.
In a Cold War-style exchange, Moscow would simultaneously hand over to the West at least one spy convicted of passing secrets to Berlin or its allies, the paper said.
"The process of consultations (with Germany) on a possible exchange was started only recently, after their conviction" on July 2, a Russian security source told the paper.
"We will get our guys out of there," the source added.
Another source told the paper Moscow had waited until after the trial was over in case the legal process shed light on how their cover had been blown.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied to the paper that any exchange had been discussed at talks in June between Russian President Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
The man known as Andreas Anschlag was jailed for six and a half years and Heidrun Anschlag for five and a half years by the higher regional court in Stuttgart.
The pair were planted in the former West Germany from 1988 by the Soviet Union's KGB secret service and later worked for its successor the SVR, the court heard.
Kommersant said the jailed couple's lawyer Horst-Dieter Petschke confirmed the swap was expected and told the paper the exchange could "happen at any moment."
It said possible candidates to be freed in Russia in such an exchange included Andrei Dumenkov, who was jailed in 2006 for 12 years for seeking to hand Germany data on Russian missile designs.
Another name cited is Valery Mikhailov, a former colonel in the Russian security service who was jailed in 2012 for 18 years for spying for the United States.
Such spy exchanges, familiar from the Cold War era, already have a precedent in post-Soviet Russian history.
In 2010, Russia and the US agreed to a sensational spy swap.
Russia's Kommersant newspaper said that the Russian secret services wanted to bring the pair - known only by their code names Andreas and Heidrun Anschlag - home to Russia after decades as "sleepers" in Germany.
In a Cold War-style exchange, Moscow would simultaneously hand over to the West at least one spy convicted of passing secrets to Berlin or its allies, the paper said.
"The process of consultations (with Germany) on a possible exchange was started only recently, after their conviction" on July 2, a Russian security source told the paper.
"We will get our guys out of there," the source added.
Another source told the paper Moscow had waited until after the trial was over in case the legal process shed light on how their cover had been blown.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied to the paper that any exchange had been discussed at talks in June between Russian President Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
The man known as Andreas Anschlag was jailed for six and a half years and Heidrun Anschlag for five and a half years by the higher regional court in Stuttgart.
The pair were planted in the former West Germany from 1988 by the Soviet Union's KGB secret service and later worked for its successor the SVR, the court heard.
Kommersant said the jailed couple's lawyer Horst-Dieter Petschke confirmed the swap was expected and told the paper the exchange could "happen at any moment."
It said possible candidates to be freed in Russia in such an exchange included Andrei Dumenkov, who was jailed in 2006 for 12 years for seeking to hand Germany data on Russian missile designs.
Another name cited is Valery Mikhailov, a former colonel in the Russian security service who was jailed in 2012 for 18 years for spying for the United States.
Such spy exchanges, familiar from the Cold War era, already have a precedent in post-Soviet Russian history.
In 2010, Russia and the US agreed to a sensational spy swap.
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