LONDON (Reuters) -The leader of a British-based Russian spy ring which prosecutors said carried out surveillance for the Kremlin was sentenced in a London court on Monday to nearly 11 years in jail, as his five team members were jailed for a total of about 40 years.
Orlin Roussev, 47, pleaded guilty before trial to one count of conspiracy to spy for Russia after police found thousands of messages between him and Wirecard fugitive Jan Marsalek, who directed the unit of Bulgarian nationals from overseas.
Judge Nicholas Hilliard sentenced Roussev to 10 years and eight months in prison, telling Roussev that the operations he had directed posed a serious risk to Britain’s national security.
Roussev is one of six Bulgarians convicted over their roles in the team directed by Marsalek to carry out surveillance on journalists, dissidents and Ukrainian soldiers being trained at a U.S. military base in Germany.
Three of the group were found guilty in March after a trial, while Roussev, his deputy Bizer Dzhambazov, 44, and a third man – Ivan Stoyanov, 33 – pleaded guilty last year.
Dzhambazov was sentenced to 10 years and two months, while his former partner Katrin Ivanova, 33, received a sentence of nine years and eight months.
Vanya Gaberova, 30, was sentenced to eight years in jail, minus a period of one year and three months which she has already spent in custody.
Her former partner Tihomir Ivanchev, 39, was sentenced to eight years. Stoyanov was sentenced to six years and four months, less time already served.
Prosecutors said the unit did not work directly for Russian intelligence and were motivated mostly by money.
The Russian embassy in London has not commented on the case, though the Kremlin has always rejected such spying allegations.
Relations between Britain and Russia have plunged to post-Cold War lows since the start of the Ukraine war, with Britain accusing Russia of trying to cause “mayhem” in Europe.
Marsalek’s lawyer in Germany – where he is wanted as the former chief operating officer of collapsed payments company Wirecard – previously declined to comment.
His whereabouts are unknown but he is believed to be in Russia.
‘INDUSTRIAL SCALE’ ESPIONAGE
Prosecutors said the spy ring’s activities posed a serious threat to British national security, while police said the unit had been “spying on an almost industrial scale”.
One of their operations was a plan to intercept mobile phone signals at Patch barracks, a U.S. base near Stuttgart where Ukrainian troops were believed to be training to use surface-to-air Patriot missiles, prosecutors added.
Much of the case focused on thousands of messages between Marsalek and Roussev, which contained half-baked plans and jokes about Russian operations on British soil, including the 2018 poisoning of Russian double agent Sergei Skripal.
In July 2022, Marsalek sent Roussev a selfie of himself dressed in full military combat gear with a “Z” logo, adopted by Russia’s military as a symbol of their invasion of Ukraine.
The pair repeatedly referred to Russia’s GRU military intelligence and other security services, and discussed plans to supply drones to Russia and weapons to Cameroon, as well as speaking of their admiration for Elon Musk.
Marsalek and Roussev also discussed organising an airlift out of Kabul in 2021 as the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan.
(Reporting by Sam Tobin; editing by Michael Holden and Andrew Heavens)
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