Участники российской шпионской сети в Италии. Коллаж: ilriformista.it
A network of Russian agents operating at the Russian embassies in Italy and the Vatican has been uncovered in Italy. In addition to intelligence activities, the operatives sought Belarusian citizens to carry out sabotage in Europe. Italian outlet Il Riformista named people who were part of the spy network and described its structure.
The key figures in the network were Ivan Petrovich Gorbachev and Mikhail Vasilyevich Astakhov, respectively the Russian Embassy in Rome’s naval attaché and deputy naval attaché, who were linked to the GRU. Both were expelled from Italy on July 9 this year following a Rome prosecutor’s investigation into the transfer of confidential information to Russia.
As a result of the investigation, two former Italian intelligence officers were arrested and accused of passing classified information to Russia. Their contacts with Gorbachev and Astakhov were established.
The spy network also included Igor Alexeyevich Anikeyev, a diplomatic adviser linked to the FSB, and Igor Albertovich Ovechkin, another adviser linked to the FSB. According to the outlet, they were involved in collecting and analyzing information about Italian state institutions, with particular attention to military and technological systems linked to NATO. They were interested not only in military technologies but also in the infrastructure supporting their operation, supplier companies, specialists, and institutional links through which decisions and information flow.
Other members of the network were Anton Andreyevich Demin andDmitry Yuryevich Morozenkov, the second and third secretaries of the Russian Embassy. The outlet links them respectively to the SVR and the GRU. They maintained contacts with Russian cultural organizations, Italian businesspeople operating in the Russian market, and other potential sources of information.
One of the activities identified as involving Russian intelligence services was an attempt to recruit citizens of Belarus and other Eastern European countries who could potentially be used to carry out sabotage against military or civilian infrastructure, the outlet reports.
Another area of activity was the systematic collection of information on vulnerabilities in digital infrastructure to identify points where possible cyberattacks could have the most serious consequences.
Riformista also notes that Italy appears to have been used as a transit hub for Russian and Belarusian citizens traveling to other European countries, while the network focused on the large volume of tourist visa applications from the two countries, coordinating information and actions related to these flows.