Explore Business Standard
Spying
Police in Haryana's Palwal have arrested a YouTuber named Wasim Akram on charges of spying for Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and its High Commission, officials said on Thursday. According to police, Akram, a resident of Kot village in Palwal district who posted videos on the history of Mewat on YouTube, was arrested on Wednesday. He had been in touch with Pakistani agents for the past three years and allegedly provided SIM cards to them, they said. Police have found several incriminating WhatsApp chats from Akram's phone, some of which were deleted, and the cyber cell is in the process of retrieving them from his phone. Palwal police had arrested another Pakistani spy, Taufiq, last week, who gave the cops the lead about Akram. Akram came in contact with Pakistani agent Danish in 2021 while applying for a visa to the neighbouring country. Although his family denied Akram travelling to Pakistan, several facts emerged during his interrogation, which point to his ...
British, Lithuanian and Latvian authorities have detained people on suspicion of carrying out intelligence-related activities on behalf of Russia in the latest of a string of incidents to be linked to Moscow by Western officials. The Metropolitan Police said Thursday they arrested three people just east of London on suspicion of spying for Russia. On Wednesday, Lithuanian prosecutors said they uncovered and detained a Russia-linked network of suspects who are alleged to have planned and organized arson attacks in various European countries. Meanwhile, Latvia's security service said it detained a man suspected of passing intelligence about the military to Russia. British police said they arrested two men, aged 41 and 46, and a 35-year-old woman in the county of Essex. They searched two addresses and later released the suspects on bail. Lithuania's prosecutor general office said suspects in a separate case are accused of sending packages containing homemade explosive devices to other
Manager of a Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) guest house was detained in Jaisalmer district on suspicion of spying for Pakistan, police said Tuesday. Mahendra Prasad, a resident of Uttarakhand's Almora, was posted as the manager of DRDO guest house in Chandan area of Jaisalmer. "He was detained on Monday. A joint interrogation will be conducted today," Superintendent of Police, Jaisalmer, Abhishek Shivhare said. "He is suspected to have provided sensitive information related to strategic operations and activities in the region," the police said. DRDO conducts tests and trials of missiles and weapons in Pokaran firing range in Jaisalmer, and experts and officials involved in the process stay in the guest house.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Saturday conducted a massive search operation at 15 locations in eight states across the country in a Pakistan-linked espionage case. The searches followed arrest of now-suspended trooper of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) for spying for Pakistan, officials said. Saturday's searches were conducted at the premises of suspects linked with Pakistan Intelligence Operatives (PIOs) in Delhi, Maharashtra (Mumbai), Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Assam and West Bengal, they said. NIA teams have seized several electronic gadgets and sensitive financial documents, along with other incriminating materials, during the searches, the officials said. These are being extensively examined for clues to the espionage racket being run by Pakistan-based operatives as part of an anti-India terror conspiracy, a statement issued by the NIA said. As per NIA investigations, the suspects targeted in today's searches had connections with Pakista
Russia's Federal Security Service on Friday accused six British diplomats of spying and said a decision has been made to withdraw their accreditation. Russian state TV quoted an official from the security service known as the FSB as saying that they will be expelled. The expulsions come as Prime Minister Keir Starmer visits Washington for talks with President Joe Biden that will include Ukraine's request to use Western-supplied weapons against targets inside Russia. Starmer said on his way to the US that Britain does not seek any conflict with Russia. Russia started this conflict. Russia illegally invaded Ukraine. Russia could end this conflict straight away, he told reporters. Ukraine has the right to self-defense and we've obviously been absolutely fully supportive of Ukraine's right to self-defense we're providing training capability, as you know. But we don't seek any conflict with Russia that's not our intention in the slightest, he said. The FSB said it received documents
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has conducted searches at locations across seven states to probe the case of classified defence information leakage through a Pakistani espionage racket, according to an official statement issued on Thursday. The premises searched on Wednesday by NIA teams were linked with suspects who had received money from Pakistan to undertake spying activities in India, it said. "Extensive searches were conducted at 16 locations in Gujarat, Karnataka, Kerala, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Haryana in the case related to leakage of classified defence information through a Pakistani ISI espionage racket," the NIA statement said. Twenty-two mobile phones and a host of sensitive documents were seized during the searches conducted by the NIA, which had in July 2023 taken over the instant case, originally registered in January 2021 by the counter-intelligence cell of Andhra Pradesh. The case involved the leakage of sensitive vital information pertaining t
Russia's foreign minister has said that Moscow has irrefutable evidence that imprisoned Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich is guilty of espionage, one day before Gershkovich is scheduled to appear in court. Sergey Lavrov blamed American journalists for helping delay US-Russia talks regarding a possible prisoner exchange by publicizing the confidential negotiations, which he said are still ongoing. Lavrov told a UN news conference on Wednesday that Gershkovich's case has nothing to do with any attacks on journalism. I would like to assure you that, just as much as you do, we are in favor of journalism and freedom of speech, Lavrov said in answer to a reporter's question. On March 29, 2023, Gershkovich was arrested while on a reporting trip in Yekaterinburg, a city in the Ural Mountains. Russian authorities did not offer any evidence that he was gathering secret information for the United States. Last month, the Russian Prosecutor General's office accused Gershkovich of .