BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

17/07/2007

Belarus official says Minsk tipped off by Russia on Polish spies

Minsk - A Belarusian KGB officer on Tuesday credited Russia's secret service for the recent arrest of five alleged Polish spies, the Belapan news agency reported.

Belarusian police arrested four Belarusian nationals and one Russian national in Minsk on Friday, and charged them with acting as secret agents for Warsaw.

Ivan Makushok, a Belarusian official working as a Kremlin liaison, said a confession to Russian secret police by one of the suspects to Russia's secret service, the FSB, led to the arrest of the other four.

According to Makushok, when Belarusian police detained the five, one, identified as Major Yurenya, identified himself as a Russian citizen and demanded he be handed over to Russian authorities.

'This guy (Yuren) told the FSB everything, and so getting a case against the others was easy,' Makushok said. Yuren would avoid a severe prison term in exchange for cooperating with investigators, he predicted.

The penalty for spying in Belarus is between seven and 15 years' imprisonment, unless loss of human life took place as a result of the espionage, in which case the penalty is death.

The Belapan report identified other members of the alleged spy ring as retired Belarusian army major Volodymyr Russkin, retired Belarusian army intelligence major Viktor Bogdan; and two Belarusian air force radio intercept specialists only by their last names Korneliuk and Petkevich.

Besides Yurenya's alleged confession, the Belarusian prosecutor will use as evidence video tapes of members of the group meeting with Polish embassy personnel in Minsk, the report said.

Portions of the tapes already have been aired on Belarus' state- run television channel. Belarus' KGB has refused to comment on the arrests.

Officials in Poland's embassy on Friday said Warsaw would comment on the Belarusian allegations in the near future, but as yet has not made a statement on the incident.

Belarus' authoritarian President Aleksander Lukashenko has repeatedly accused Poland's government of working to undermine his regime by covert means.

Belarus' state-controlled media in 2006 accused diplomats in Poland's embassy to Minsk of acting as go-betweens between Belarusian dissident groups and western governments.

Belarusian security teams arrested Polish military attache Kasimez Witaschy in April 2004 on spying charges. He was ejected from Belarus a few weeks later.

Source:

http://news.monstersandcritics.com/europe/news/article_1331134.php/Belarus_official_says_Minsk_tipped_off_by_Russia_on_Polish_spies