How a Soviet Triple Agent Recruited New Spies in the West

[Nevilledog]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/leaked-kgb-manual-reveals-how-soviet-spies-recruited-in-europe

Austrian financier Jan Marsalek disappeared on June 18, the same day the 40-year old was fired from his position as chief operating officer of Wirecard, a German financial services provider. A €1.9 billion hole had been discovered in Wirecard’s accounts by an independent auditor and Marsalek had been fingered as the one responsible for it.

Investigative journalists affiliated with Bellingcat, a digital forensic website, suggested that Marsalek fled from Germany to Belarus via Estonia, and then had been taken to Russia by the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence service. Further reporting by the Financial Times revealed that Marsalek appeared to have close links to the GRU, which has been very busy of late.

Among the classified materials Marsalek possessed before his escape from Austria were a set of papers related to an investigation by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) into the poisoning of Sergei Skripal. Those documents included the formula for Novichok, the deadly nerve agent used by two GRU assassins in their attempted murder of Skripal, a former GRU officer turned MI6 agent, in Salisbury two years ago. The OPCW was able to trace the origin of the papers Marsalek was carrying—it turned out that they had been leaked to him from the Austrian ministries.

If Marsalek’s Russian connections are true, he was simply the latest in a long line of Austrian citizens who, whether by accident or design, became hirelings of Moscow.

*snip*

[crickets]

1. K&R for visibility.

[Klaralven]

2. .