BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

13/07/2007

Belarus KGB claims arrest of five Polish spies (Roundup)

Minsk - The Belarusian KGB on Friday arrested what it said were five spies working for the Polish government, a counterintelligence official told the Interfax news agency.

The Belarusian national TV station Bel-1 reported four of the five detainees were Belarusian citizens, and the fifth a Russian national.

All the suspects were Belarusian citizens, the official said, citing his status as a KGB agent as grounds for anonymity.

There was no immediate comment on the incident from the Polish embassy in Minsk. An official at the Russian embassy said he 'was not aware' of the detention of any Russian citizen by Belarusian authorities on espionage charges.

A Minsk prosecutor is preparing charges against the detainees of 'wilfully providing secured state information to a foreign state ... with the goal of undermining the government,' the KGB official said.

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 KGB announcement came after months of deteriorating relations between Minsk and Warsaw, a NATO state and one of the most active critics of authoritarian Belarusian President Aleksander Lukashenko.

Lukashenko and most senior Belarusian officials are banned from travelling to NATO nations, and links between Belarus' economy and that of the European Union are marginal.

Lukashenko has retaliated with crackdowns against Belarusian organizations believed by the KGB to be cooperating with NATO nations towards removing him from office.

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.

Belarusian KGB raids more recently have targeted evangelical Christian organizations and Polish ethnic societies - both, according to Lukashenko, long being used by Polish and other NATO secret services to undermine his regime.

c 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Source:

http://news.monstersandcritics.com/europe/news/article_1329766.php/Belarus_KGB_claims_arrest_of_five_Polish_spies__Roundup_