In a Wary Arctic Norway Starts to See Russian Spies Everywhere

Other European countries are too, blurring the line between vigilance and paranoia. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. Anyone can read what you share. TROMSO, Norway — In hindsight, some things just didn’t add up about Jose Giammaria. For one, the visiting researcher at the University of Tromso, in Norway’s Arctic Circle, was ostensibly Brazilian. But he couldn’t speak Portuguese. Then there was the fact that he self-funded his visit, an oddity in academia, and even planned to extend it — yet he never talked about his research. But he was always helpful, even offering to redesign the home page for the Center for Peace Studies, where he worked. That was until Oct. 24, when Norway’s security police, the PST, arrived with a warrant to search his office. Days later, they announced his arrest as a Russian spy, named Mikhail Mikushin. The revelation sent a chill through campus, said Marcela Douglas, who heads the Center for Peace Studies, which researches security and conflict. “I started to see spies everywhere.”So is Norway, and much of the rest of Europe, too. As the war in Ukraine bogs down and Moscow’s isolation increases, European nations have grown wary that a desperate Kremlin is exploiting their open societies to deepen attempts at spying, sabotage and infiltration — possibly to send a message, or to probe how far it could go if needed in a broader conflict with the West. Mr. Mikushin is one of three Russians recently arrested in Europe on suspicion of being “illegals” — spies who embed in a local society for long-term espionage or recruitment. In June, an intern at the International Criminal Court, also with a Brazilian passport, was arrested in The Hague and charged with spying for Russia. In late November, a Swedish raid caught a Russian couple accused of espionage. Other suspicious incidents have popped up across Europe: In Germany, drones found flying over military sites where Ukrainians forces were being trained are strongly suspected by German officials of being Russian intelligence. Undersea cables cut in France, while not attributed to malignant intent, have raised suspicions among security analysts. And a hack of fuel distribution networks in Belgium and Germany days before Russia’s invasion also raised alarm. Not all of the incidents can be traced to the Kremlin with certainty, and in many places, heightened vigilance and real concern have become hard to separate from widening paranoia. Russia has called a string of recent Norwegian arrests, mostly of Russian citizens for flying drones, a form of “hysteria.”Norway, however, may have more reasons to worry than most. Now that Western sanctions have all but cut off Russian fossil fuels to Europe, Norway is the biggest oil and gas supplier to the continent.


All data is taken from the source: http://nytimes.com
Article Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/12/world/europe/arctic-norway-russian-spies.html


#norway #newsfeed #newsbefunny #upnews #newstvlive #7newstoday #