MILITARY PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE WARNS OF INCREASED WESTERN INTELLIGENCE ACTIVITY IN RUSSIA.

A spokesman for the Russian chief military prosecutor’s office said that Western intelligence services are expanding their operations in Russia, acting both openly and covertly, in covert operations by using Russian citizens whom they are recruiting for the purpose. The spokesman recalled that in old Soviet judicial practice, Russian citizens exposed as working for foreign intelligence services usually received the death penalty. But since 1992, nobody sentenced to death in Russia for high treason was actually executed. The spokesman also complained that in many individual cases, the punishment for foreign spies was softer than that envisaged by law. (8)

This statement coincides with a general increase of anti- Western sentiment in Russia, when even many liberal Russian politicians express suspicion and mistrust of the West’s intentions. The statement may also be a response to Zhirinovsky’s appeal, in one of his recent speeches, for the restoration of the notion of "enemy of the people."

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