BULGARIA EXPELS RUSSIAN MILITARY ATTACHÉ FOR SPYING FOR GRU

SOURCE: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

22 December 2020 BULGARIA EXPELS RUSSIAN MILITARY ATTACHÉ FOR SPYING FOR GRU

Bulgarian authorities expelled a senior diplomat in the Russian embassy in Sofia over alleged espionage. He is the sixth diplomat to be expelled by Bulgaria throughout 2020 for suspected espionage. The official had worked for the GRU military intelligence service and had been seeking sensitive military information, including on the U.S. military activity in Bulgaria.

Bulgaria’s foreign ministry informed about the case on December 18. Bulgarian authorities have given a Russian diplomat 72 hours to leave the country due to activities incompatible with his diplomatic status. This euphemism comes most often in cases of diplomats involved in espionage activities. The Bulgarian prosecutor’s office issued a separate statement alleging that from 2017 until now the diplomat “has engaged in spying activities, during which he collected military information, including about the numbers of U.S. troops deployed on Bulgarian territory during exercises.” Prosecutors and counterintelligence officers at the State Agency for National Security also added they had evidence that the diplomat had been in contact with a Bulgarian citizen with access to classified information to whom money had been offered. The expelled diplomat is a Russian military attaché, thus