BERLIN (GERMANY) – Federal prosecutors in Germany have charged a citizen with espionage, alleging that he passed floor plans of the Bundestag parliament building to Russian intelligence.
While working for a firm hired to maintain electrical equipment in the Bundestag’s buildings, the man identified only as Jens F. managed to secure PDF files with the floor plans, said the prosecutor’s office in a statement.
The charges are expected to further strain the ties between Russia and Germany, which protested against the arrest of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny shortly after he returned to Russia from months of convalescence in Germany following the poisoning episode allegedly by Russian state security services.
According to prosecutors, the suspect had decided to pass on the floor plans to Russian agencies in 2017. He sent a data storage device to an employee at the Russian embassy who worked mainly for Russian intelligence agency GRU.
This is not the first time in which Russian security services have allegedly spied on the German parliament. In 2016, Germany said the parliament’s computer systems were hacked by Russians the year before.
Reports of espionage could give further ammo to opponents of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline connecting Germany and Russia under the Baltic Sea.