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Boris Berezovsky Counted among the Spies
The FSB announced a new espionage case yesterday based on testimony from former major in the tax police Vyacheslav Zharko, who claims that the British MI6 tried to recruit him. According to Zharko, political emigrant Boris Berezonvsky and former KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko introduced him to MI6 agents. Alexander Goldfarb, head of the Foundation for Civil Liberties, thinks the case is a smear campaign against Berezovsky.
Zharko gave an interview to Komsomolskaya pravda and The Sunday Times newspapers and Russia Today television on Saturday in which he said that he worked for British intelligence between 2003 and June of this year. Importantly, he linked Berezovsky and Litvinenko, who died of poisoning in London, to British intelligence. Litvinenko was first linked to British intelligence by Andrey Lugovoi after the British prosecutor accused Lugovoi of Litvinenko's murder.
On Sunday, Russian Ambassador in London Yury Fedotov spoke to The Sunday Times about Russophobia in England. “I can quote examples where Russians were beaten by youngsters in London. Tourists, visitors, businessmen. They were severely beaten and the police did not open any investigation on these particular incidents,” the ambassador said, adding that Russian were sometimes refused service in British stores and cafes. His remarks were heavily repeated in the Russian press.
Obviously, the spy case and Fedotov's statements are a reaction to the British decision on Friday not to strip Berezovsky of his political refugee status. Berezovsky will soon be tried in absentia for the embezzlement of 214 million rubles from Aeroflot and faces charges of attempting to overthrow the Russian government as well. Berezovsky was unavailable for comment yesterday. Goldfarb opined that Russian authorities had begun a smear campaign against Berezovsky, who is “the most important source of financing for the political opposition in Russia.”
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of July 09, 2007
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