A former reserve officer in the Bundeswehr is said to have provided a Russian military attaché with information for years. He describes his work as work for reconciliation, the federal prosecutor as espionage.
Düsseldorf (dpa / lnw) - The federal prosecutor's office has applied for a two-year suspended sentence against a former reserve officer in the Bundeswehr for espionage for Russia. In addition, he should pay 25,000 euros. The accused had provided the Russian secret service GRU with information for years, particularly about the reservists in the Bundeswehr. "He made common cause with the Russian state," said a representative of the Federal Prosecutor's Office on Thursday in his pleading at the Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court.
He fully admitted that the documents had been sent. This cannot be explained with mere naivety or naïveté, nor with the idea of international understanding. Although he did not receive any money from Moscow for it, he was invited to the Moscow Security Conference. The Russian state paid for the flight, hotel and participation. It was about attention and invitations.
The defender of the 65-year-old German, on the other hand, demanded an acquittal. None of the information passed on was secret, everything was publicly accessible. "It was just cold coffee with zero informational value," he said.
The federal prosecutor's office saw things differently: Russia had no reservists, which the accused viewed as a deficit. The 65-year-old knew that his interlocutors belonged to the Russian secret service GRU and exchanged views with them about the use of secure email addresses for a conspiratorial approach.
In his concluding remarks, the accused asserted: "I wanted to build a bridge, I never had any bad intentions". His grandfather and father should have gone to war against Russia. He promised his father before his death that he would do his best to ensure that there would be no more war. Russia's attack on Ukraine in February of this year "got the bottom out of this work," he said. "Criminal groups had created a dictatorship" in Russia.
In civilian life, the 65-year-old was a sales manager for a US company - he had been released because of the investigation. As a reserve officer in the Bundeswehr, he held the rank of lieutenant colonel. Since 2014 he is said to have provided the Russian secret service GRU with information as a spy.
The reserve officer passed on the information mainly by e-mail, but also in personal meetings. In doing so, he acted against the interests of the Federal Republic of Germany and the USA. The court wants to announce the verdict on November 18th.
