Bulgaria indicts six suspected of spying for Russia

Bulgarian military prosecutors filed indictments on Thursday against six people, including several acting defence ministry officials, accused of spying for Russia.

Those indicted have “set up and managed a group for spying, collecting and transfering to a foreign country information that constitutes state secrets… and served as its spies,” Sofia’s regional military prosecution said in a statement.

“Three of the people divulged foreign classified information of a military nature,” it added.

A former high-ranking military intelligence officer headed the group and recruited acting officials with unlimited access to classified information that belonged to Bulgaria and to the country’s EU and NATO partners, the statement said.

These included two officers at Bulgaria’s military intelligence, a defence ministry department chief and an official who oversaw classified information at the administration of parliament.

They were paid to deliver the confidential information to the ring leader and his wife, of dual Bulgarian and Russian nationality, who passed it on to an employee of the Russian embassy in Sofia, prosecution spokesman Siyka Mileva told a press conference when the six were arrested in mid-March.

Five of the accused remain in custody while one was released on bail.

The court is yet to schedule a preliminary hearing in the case.

Russo-Bulgarian relations have been hit by several spy scandals in recent years.

Between October 2019 and the end of 2020, five Russian diplomats and a technical assistant at the Russian embassy were expelled from Bulgaria, including Russia’s military attache who allegedly coordinated the ring.

The rows have soured relations between the two former allies, which had maintained their close cultural, historical and economic ties even after the fall of the communist regime in 1989.