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UK sources level fresh spying accusations against Russia

08 April 2012 03:17 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. A senior British source has accused Russia of running an embassy of spies in London while Britain itself is facing a series of spying charges through its cultural and political proxies in other countries especially the British Councils, APA reports quoting Press TV.

The security source told The Daily Telegraph that up to half of the Russian embassy personnel could be spying on Britain.

Others have also accused Moscow of having some 40 operatives in Britain at any one time who engage in industrial espionage, monitor Russian tycoons based in Britain and track any possible thread that may lead them to valuable intelligence on the US.

Oleg Gordievsky, former head of the Russian spy agency KGB who was exposed as British double agent, said Russians are now operating more agents in Britain than they were doing in mid 1980â€™s when the Russian embassy reportedly housed 39 spies.

This is while, it has been Britain which has been proved to be spying on other nations including Russia over the past years.

Back in January, Jonathan Powell, the chief of staff of former British PM Tony Blair, admitted that Russian television was right in reporting six years ago that London used a rock in Moscow for receiving and transmitting information gathered by its spies.

At the time, the then Russian president Vladimir Putin introduced a law to curb the British embassyâ€™s funding of Russian non-governmental organizations saying the funding was from security services to â€˜interfereâ€™ in Russiaâ€™s internal affairs.

Two years later in February 2008, the then presidential hopeful Dimitry Medvedev said Moscow has been right to close down the British Councilâ€™s outlets in St Petersburg and Yekaterinburg on espionage charges.

â€œIt is known that state-financed structures like the British Council conduct a mass of other activities that are not so widely publicized,â€ Medvedev said at the time.

"Among other things, they are involved in gathering information and conducting espionage activities," he added.

The British Council has also been identified as a den of espionage by officials in other countries, including Iran and Afghanistan.

Britain has always denied the NGOâ€™s role in spying practices, however, British PM David Cameron did suggest back in November 2010 that the British Council along with the BBC, constitute part of Britainâ€™s soft power around the world during a parliamentary debate on culling the quangos.

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UK sources level fresh spying accusations against Russia

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