Norway’s police intelligence agency PST has uncovered what it claims is an organized effort by Russian officials to recruit spies within Norway. They’re allegedly targeting Ukraininian refugees, and pressuring them into espionage through not so subtle threats against their families back home.
Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) was leading its morning news reports on Wednesday with PST’s warnings. Atle Tangen, who leads PST’s counterespionage unit, said Ukrainians can be subjected to pressure or threats: “It can occur through threats directed at families located in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine,” he told NRK.
The threats have come through messages written in Russian and sent via mobile telephones to Ukrainians in Southern Norway. In one exchange, an alleged recruiter greeted the Ukrainian, said he knew where his family lived in their partially Russian-occupied Ukrainian city and asked the Ukrainian in Norway to take photos of a specific military installation in Norway.
When there was no response, the alleged recruiter wrote again, asked whether the photos had been taken and, if not, asked again about his family in the Ukrainian city under partial Russian control. According to PST, the exchange ended with a warning that “I can only help them if you cooperate.”
PST wouldn’t say how many such recruitment attempts they’ve uncovered. Tens of thousands of Ukrainians have found refuge in Norway since Russia first attacked and tried to invade Ukraine more than four years ago, around 22,000 of them from areas now occupied by Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin still hasn’t won his war as it drags into its fifth year, and seems to be reverting to desperate tactics.
“Russia is best at pressuring, frightening and torturing,” the leader of the Ukrainian association in Norway, Natalia Ravn-Christensen, told NRK. She’s not surprised by PST’s warnings of Russian espionage recruitment efforts: “Russia has been recruiting agents for a long time, also before the full-scale invasion.”
PST said it wants to raise consciousness about the alleged recruitment and warn Ukrainians in Norway to be aware of how it. PST claims Russian agents can track them down, assess their refugee status, family situation, where they lived and worked in Ukraine and now in Norway. The initial approach can seem friendly but harden as the recruitment process continues.
“Their aim is to gain information and chart various things in Norway,” Tangen said. “We want eliminate their attempts at operations here.” Officials at the Russian Embassy in Oslo have earlier dismissed any accusations of espionage in Norway.
NewsinEnglish.no/Nina Berglund
