Espionage by foreign intelligence services should not only be punishable in Austria if it is directed against domestic interests, but also if other states or international organizations are spied on. This plan by the Green Justice Minister Alma Zadic met with broad approval from the coalition partner ÖVP and the opposition.
Zadic wants to close existing “gaps”. “We have to make sure that all espionage activities in Austria are punishable, regardless of who they are directed against,” Zadic said on ORF “Morgenjournal” on Thursday.
Numerous international organizations such as the UN, the OSCE and OPEC have their headquarters in Vienna, as well as many diplomatic missions. The existing regulation makes it relatively easy for foreign secret services in Austria.
Currently, only those who spy on a ministry are prosecuted, not those who do so at the UN.
Karner’s additional request
Interior Minister Gerhard Karner (VP) supports a “tightening of punishments”, but has an additional wish: the authorities should also be allowed to listen to telephone calls made via messenger services. The Greens have so far rejected this. In other European countries there is the possibility that Karner is aiming for.
SP justice spokeswoman Selma Yildirim is in favor of expanding paragraph 256, FP mandater Harald Stefan can also imagine a higher sentence; Currently, a prison sentence of six months to five years is envisaged. Neos MP Stefanie Krisper is offended by the fact that even espionage against the interests of Austria’s EU neighbors is not a punishable offense – that needs to change.
Image: (Wirecard)
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Image: (Wirecard)
New details on the allegations against Egisto Ott, the now arrested ex-agent of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and Combating Terrorism (BVT): According to the arrest warrant published by “Falter”, Ott “systematically obtained secret facts and personal data from police databases for the purpose of Transmission collected to (former Wirecard board member) Jan Marsalek and unknown representatives of the Russian authorities.”
Marsalek dealt with Russian intelligence officers and often stayed in Moscow. He used four Austrian passports and one diplomatic passport.
The Viennese has been on the run since June 2020 and is wanted on an international arrest warrant for commercial gang fraud as well as breach of trust and other property and economic crimes. He is considered the main suspect in Wirecard’s balance sheet falsification amounting to at least 1.9 billion euros. He is probably currently in Russia.
His accomplice Ott is said to have spied on behalf of Russia on opponents of the regime who were seeking protection in Europe under the pretext of observing extremists.
The 86-page arrest order gives the example of a former FSB agent who fled Russia with his family and received asylum in Montenegro. In order to hunt down the ex-agent, Ott “knowingly abused his sovereign authority”, i.e. exercised his office illegally.
The secret formula for the neurotoxin Novichok was found on Ott’s cell phone. This powerful neurotoxin was developed in the Soviet Union in the 1970s. Also discovered was an “error analysis and suggestions for improvement” on how to “ensure the smooth handling of attacks” on critics of Russian President Vladimir Putin – for example in the “Tiergarten Murder” in Berlin, in which the assassins from Russia were arrested.
Ott allegedly justified himself by saying that they were “just games.”