Man accused of being a Russian spy pretended to be Brazilian in Norway

The Norwegian police arrested this Monday (24) a man who pretended to be Brazilian but is accused of being a spy in the service of Russia. The information was given by public broadcaster NRK this Tuesday (25), citing the PST, the Nordic country’s security service.

The man, whose identity was not revealed — only his approximate age, between 30 and 40 years old — identified himself as a scientist at the University of Tromsö, in the north of the country, but the police believe he is actually a Russian citizen.

PST deputy chief Hevig Moe told NRK that the man, as a spy, represents a “threat to fundamental national interests” and that he should therefore be expelled from Norway.

In a tweet, the corporation said it opened an investigation into the case, anticipating that the alleged Brazilian scientist is suspected of violating at least two articles of the Penal Code, involving intelligence actions that could harm the national interest and the security of other states.

The Minister of Justice, Emilie Enger Mehl, told the Norwegian public network that the ministry, after being notified of the case on the 20th, is studying to revoke the residence permit of the accused. Also according to NRK, he would have arrived in the Nordic country about a year ago, in the autumn of the Northern Hemisphere of 2021, for a period of research.

The dean of the institution confirmed that he was informed of the researcher’s detention on Monday. The PST believes he sought to establish himself in the country under a false identity while secretly working for Russian intelligence.

Moe said the PST feared that the man had amassed a network of contacts and information about the northern region of the country and that this was “misused” by the Kremlin.

The northern part of Norway is close to the Arctic and the border with Moscow. Norway, which is part of NATO, the US-led military alliance at the heart of the Ukrainian War, increased security in that portion of its territory after the conflict began in February.

Its Nordic neighbors, Finland and Sweden, also moved in the wake of the war, abandoning neutrality and applying for NATO membership — as yet unconfirmed.

The PST did not respond to Reuters requests for comment, and the Russian embassy did not comment on the case to the NRK network. The man’s lawyer, Thomas Hansen, said only that he denies the allegations and disagrees with the legal basis used for his detention.

The Norwegian case recalls another from June, when the Federal Police reported that Russian Sergei Vladimirovitch Tcherkasov, 36, was in the custody of Brazilian authorities and would be prosecuted for using false documents after being deported by the Netherlands, which also accused him of spying.

The Amsterdam Intelligence Service announced at the time that it had prevented Cherkasov, posing as a Brazilian citizen, from infiltrating the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, responsible for investigating, among other accusations, possible war crimes committed in the War of Ukraine.

Cherkasov would work for the GRU, the Russian Defense military intelligence unit, and would have pretended to be Viktor Muller Ferreira to enter Dutch territory. The episode took place in April, but was only released in June.

According to the PF, Tcherkasov had entered Brazil in 2010 and assumed the false identity of a Brazilian, with which he lived for years in Ireland and the USA.