Three Detained in Britain are Suspected of Spying for Russia

A group of individuals detained in February 2023 as part of an anti-terrorism investigation in the United Kingdom are accused of working for Russian intelligence services.

This information was reported by the British publication BBC.

According to the Counter Terrorism Division from the Metropolitan Police, three individuals have been charged with possession of fake documents that identify their identity and their use with "unlawful intent" in connection to their work for Russian intelligence services.

During the course of the investigation, passports and identification documents from citizens of Great Britain, Bulgaria, France, Italy, Spain, Croatia, Slovenia, Greece, and the Czech Republic were discovered in the possession of the suspects.

Orlin Roussev, Bizer Dzhambazov, and Katrin Ivanova were arrested by counter-terrorism detectives of the London police back in February. Currently, they are in custody and are scheduled to appear in court at Old Bailey in January of next year.

All three suspects, who were allegedly involved in espionage for the Kremlin, had been residing in the United Kingdom for many years, changing their workplaces and residences from time to time.

Roussev, for instance, worked in Russian business and moved to Britain in 2009. After spending around three years in the financial services sector, he started his own company specializing in "signal intelligence" - intercepting communications or electronic signals.

Bizer Dzhambazov and Katrin Ivanova, according to statements from former neighbors, were a couple. The man supposedly worked as an ambulance driver, while his wife worked as a laboratory assistant at a private medical center. The couple moved to Britain ten years ago and established a public organization aimed at helping Bulgarian citizens become more familiar with the "culture and norms of British society."

According to open data from Bulgarian government authorities, Dzhambazov and Ivanova also worked at foreign polling stations for Bulgarian citizens in London during national elections in Bulgaria.

The exposure of Russian spies has become one of the key tasks of European intelligence agencies following the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Reports of the discovery of Russian agents have come from the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Austria, Poland, Slovenia, and many other countries.

For example, last week in Germany, an official from a department dealing with military technology and information technology was accused of passing secret information to Russia.

At the end of last December, a high-ranking official from Germany's external intelligence agency BND was arrested and accused of espionage for the Kremlin. A month later, his potential accomplice was also apprehended.

Similarly, it has recently been revealed that the 15th member of a Russian spy network was detained in Poland. The man was arrested during a large-scale investigation conducted by the Lublin Department of the National Prosecutor's Office. According to the investigation, the spy gathered information about critical infrastructure, military objects, and ports, and then provided it to Russian intelligence services in exchange for rewards.