Russia’s spy agency is waging a massive undercover campaign of harassment against British and US diplomats, as well as other targets, using deniable “psychological” techniques developed by the KGB, a new book reveals.
The Federal Security Service (FSB) operation involves breaking into the private homes of Western diplomats — a method the US State Department describes as “home intrusions.” Typically, the agents move around personal items, open windows and set alarms in an attempt to demoralize and intimidate their targets.
The FSB operation includes the bugging of private apartments, widespread phone tapping, physical surveillance and e-mail interception. Its victims include local Russian staff working for Western embassies, opposition activists, human rights workers and journalists.
The clandestine campaign is revealed in Mafia State, a book by the Guardian’s former Moscow correspondent Luke Harding and published by Guardian Books.
The British and US governments are acutely aware of the FSB’s campaign of intimidation. However, neither has publicly complained about these demonstrative “-counter--intelligence” measures, for fear of further straining already difficult relations with Russian Prime Minister Vladmir Putin’s resurgent regime.
“Generally, we don’t make a fuss about it,” one said.
So pervasive is the FSB’s campaign that the British government is unable to fully staff its Moscow embassy. The intrusions are designed to “short-tour” diplomats so they leave their posts early, the source said.
Despite a recent improvement in US-Russian relations, the FSB has also targeted US diplomats and their families. In a 2009 confidential diplomatic cable leaked by WikiLeaks, US Ambassador in Moscow John Beyrle complains that the FSB’s aggressive measures have reached unprecedented levels.
Mafia State recounts how the KGB first became interested in -“operational psychology” in the 1960s. However, it was the Stasi, East Germany’s sinister secret police, that perfected these psychological techniques and used them extensively against dissidents in the 1970s and 1980s.
According to former Stasi officers, the aim was to “switch off” regime opponents by disrupting their private or family lives. Tactics included removing pictures from walls, replacing one variety of tea with another, and even sending a sex toy to a target’s wife. Usually, victims had no idea the Stasi were responsible. Many thought they were going mad; some suffered breakdowns; a few killed themselves.
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