Katrin Ivanova, Vanya Gaberova and Tihomir Ivanchev were personally selected by Russian agents to spy for Moscow and knew exactly what they were doing, although they do not admit guilt and claim that they were “led or deceived”, said prosecutor Alison Morgan at the Central Criminal Court in London during the trial against the Bulgarian spy cell, BNR reported.
Tihomir Ivanchev, Vanya Gaberova and Katrin Ivanova claim that they thought they were helping Biser Dzhambazov and Orlin Rusev – the group's agents, to expose corruption or to catch criminals, with the full conviction that they were working for Interpol, whose agent Dzhambazov presented himself as.
However, Alison Morgan told the jury that they could laugh at their actions as amateurs or find incompetence, but let them not forget the context, because everything that happened was for the benefit of Russia, an enemy of the United Kingdom.
“They may have been amateurs, but they knew that they were trying to spy at a high level with very high stakes“, the chief prosecutor pointed out.
And in court again the data on the spying operations around the US military base in Stuttgart to access the phones of Ukrainian soldiers, the surveillance of investigative journalist Hristo Grozev and Russian dissident Kiril Kachur and the trips to Austria for this purpose were presented, Spain and Montenegro with precision surveillance equipment.
The vast amount of high-tech equipment found in Orlin Rusev's Great Yarmouth home and the many false identity documents were also recalled.
It is alleged that the operations were led by Austrian citizen and Russian agent Jan Marsalek, the former boss of the bankrupt Wirecard company, who is wanted for a £1.6 billion fraud. The court again heard that Rusev and Marsalek discussed using Gaberova as a “sex trap” for Grozev after she added him as a friend on Facebook.
“Do you think that in such a high-level espionage with very high stakes, the main conspirators Rusev, Dzhambazov and Marsalek would choose random people they don't trust or just people who have no idea what they are doing?“, asked prosecutor Alison Morgan.
Rusev and Dzhambazov have pleaded guilty. Ivanova, Gaberova and Ivanchev continue to deny knowingly spying for Russia. The trial is ongoing.