Russian citizen accused of spying on military units in Poland

The Gdańsk Military Prosecutor’s Office in Poland has indicted a Russian citizen accused of spying for Russian intelligence, which operated in Poland from 2015 to April 2022.

In April 2022, agents from the Military Counterintelligence Service  caught the suspect. Polish counterintelligence allegedly found that he was helping Russian military intelligence “by getting and collecting information about the Polish Armed Forces.”

According to Grażyna Wawryniuk, a spokesperson for the regional prosecutor’s office in Gdansk, the man’s suspected espionage activities were focused on military units located in the northeastern part of Poland, within which the accused performed tasks aimed at gathering intelligence on the Polish Armed Forces.

Vavryniuk also noted that the accused received information about the location of individual military units, their organizational and staffing structure, their actual number, command structure, and salaries of soldiers. He also got information about the weapons used by each unit, the types of equipment, changes in operations, communication and liaison procedures, and how the military worked together.

According to investigators from the Military Counterintelligence Service, the information was passed on to Russian special services.

According to the prosecutor’s office, the Russian spy had been living legally in Poland for many years. During his stay in Poland, the accused was engaged in business activities and participated in historical reconstruction groups, which allowed him to establish and maintain contacts with the Polish military.

The Russian is currently in custody in Poland. He could face up to 10 years in prison for his crimes.

The regional prosecutor’s office in Gdansk said that the indictment is one of several things that military prosecutors are doing right now to look into what Russia and Belarus have been doing to spy on the Polish Armed Forces.

At the same time, Polish intelligence warns of the increased threat of information operations.

“The West cannot afford to be nave today.” “We must be able to block Russian intelligence operations that do not resort to purely military action but are just as dangerous as classic warfare,” said Stanislaw Jarin, an authorized representative of the Information Security Council.