BERLIN SPY COULD HAVE BLOWN COVER OF UP TO 20 AGENTS
Fears embassy guard passed Brit spooks’ details to Russia
TOP spooks fear as many as 20 MI6 officers working in Germany may have had their cover blown.
An urgent security review is now under way after the arrest of Berlin British embassy security guard David Smith on espionage charges.
Spymasters at London’s Vauxhall Cross secret service HQ need to know how much damage has been allegedly done by the stocky, balding 57-year-old.
And they may have to dismantle MI6 Berlin station and start again if too many agents have been compromised.
A former spycatcher said: “Smith was what is known in the game as an ears and eyes informant. And us spies cannot get enough of them.”
Although he would not have had access to secret documents he would have known all the MI6 staffers in the embassy, had access to their phone numbers, and be able to pick up gossip about their private lives. If passed to the
Russians, that could have helped them identify anyone ripe for defection.
Smith would also have been able to spot other MI6 officers working undercover who visited the embassy.
The ex-spook said: “He would have been able to supply invaluable details such as times officers left the Embassy, what they were wearing and the cars they drove.”
That would have enabled surveillance teams from the Russian SVR intelligence service to tail them more easily.
Although it is not known when Smith was allegedly recruited by the SVR it is understood he was first suspected in November and had been watched ever
since. He has been accused of giving away counter-terrorism details which could have included floor plans, entry systems and alarms.
Ex-Tory MP Rupert Allason, who uses the alias Nigel West as a spy expert, said: “He would have seen the most recent Foreign Office security review and known about arrangements if the embassy was occupied or hostages taken.
“He seems to have been caught before he could do more serious damage.”
Former KGB major Boris Karpichkov added: “The damage even low-fly agents cause can be devastating.
“He could have been ordered to instal listening and video devices in restricted
areas such as the embassy’s briefing room or even the MI6 “resident’s” office.”
Lawyer Julian Hayes, nephew of former Labour minister and Czech spy John Stonehouse, has just written a book about his uncle’s spying activities.
He said: “There is a new Cold War. Our politicians and those working closely with them continue to be susceptible to recruitment.”
And Thomas Haldenwang, head of the BvD, Germany’s MI5 equivalent, said that Russia had “significantly” increased its activity.
Smith lives in a two-room ground floor apartment in Potsdam on the western outskirts of Berlin – once the site of a key KGB’s East German base.
Russian president Vladimir Putin often went there as a young KGB officer liaising with left-wing terror groups such as the Baader-Meinhof gang.
Last week Smith was remanded in custody by a federal judge in Karlsruhe charged under German law with “activity as an agent for a foreign secret service.”