The SBU reports on the discovery of a network of “spies of the Russian General Staff” in the Nikolaev region
Counterintelligence officers of the special service and the SBU Directorate in the Nikolaev region “stopped the activity of an agent network in the region created by representatives of the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation,” a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
This was reported by the press center of the Security Service of Ukraine.
“In the framework of criminal proceedings opened under Part 1 of Art. 111 (high treason) and part 1 of Art. 114 (espionage) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, SBU operatives documented the illegal activities of a group of Nikolaev residents who contributed to the Russian special service in carrying out subversive activities against our country,” the report says.
SBU officers established that “the attackers, on instructions from Russian military intelligence, created an extensive intelligence network of local residents, who, in particular, collected intelligence information about the socio-political situation in Nikolaev, the activities of local patriotic organizations and their activists, the deployment and movements of armed forces units Ukraine, military equipment, their involvement in the Joint Forces operation in eastern Ukraine.”
The organizers of the network allegedly transferred the obtained data to a curator from the Russian intelligence service using closed communication channels.
During searches at the place of residence of the organizers and participants of the intelligence network of the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, intelligence officers “discovered and seized communications equipment that was used for contacts with Russian intelligence officers, computer equipment and electronic storage media on which the collected information was processed, and handwritten draft records of activities local patriotic organizations and movements of military equipment, the number of personnel of military units stationed in Nikolaev.”
Unregistered weapons, cartridges of various calibers, explosive devices, a map of the Nikolaev region with marks of railway bridges, topographic maps of the Nikolaev and Kherson regions, a large amount of Russian symbols and propaganda materials were also confiscated from the “spies.”
The seized materials were included in criminal proceedings as evidence.
Special service operatives detained two residents of the Nikolaev region, who were declared “organizers of the network”, suspected of committing crimes, and a preventive measure was chosen in the form of arrest for a period of sixty days. Separate procedural decisions will be made regarding other participants in the agent network, the SBU notes.
The SBU reports the uncovering of a network of "Russian General Staff spies" in the Mykolaiv region.