MOSCOW, January 23 (RIA Novosti) - The fate of four British diplomats accused of espionage will be determined at the political level, the Federal Security Service (FSB) said Monday.
"This issue requires a political solution," FSB spokesman, Colonel Sergei Ignatchenko, said in comments on whether the embassy employees would be allowed to stay in Moscow.
Ignatchenko said that the FSB had identified four British agents who were operating in Moscow under diplomatic cover.
"We found out that they were financing a number of non-governmental organizations," Ignatchenko said, adding that it remained to be established how exactly the funds had been used.
The FSB spokesman's comments came after a program broadcast on Sunday evening on a state television channel, Rossiya, featured interviews with people who claimed to be representatives of the FSB. They said British agents had planted a transmitter in an imitation rock on a Moscow street to record classified computer data, which was later downloaded by British Embassy employees. The allegations in the program were based on a recording made by a hidden FSB camera.
The program also alleged that Marc Doe, a first secretary at the British Embassy in Moscow, had been authorizing regular payments to Russian NGOs. Several documents signed by him were shown as evidence of cash payments to NGOs operating in Moscow, including 23,000 pounds (about $40,000) to the Moscow Helsinki Group, and 5,719 pounds ($9,700) to one more organization, the Eurasia Foundation. Another document signed by Doe, a 27-year-old graduate of Durham University, contained information on cash payments under an obscure project for establishing schools of public inspectors in remote areas of Siberia and Russia's Far East.
Apart from Doe, the program said embassy employees Christopher Pirt, 30, and Paul Cronton, were also involved in espionage, as was 32-year-old researcher Andre Fleming.
FSB spokesperson Diana Shemyakina said earlier that thousands of NGOs were working in Russia, of which only 92 were officially registered by the Justice Ministry. Most of them were founded and provided with funds by the U.S. government and public organizations, and by its NATO allies, she said.
Ignatchenko also said that FSB officials had met with the British colleague in Moscow last week and had made it clear that spying against Russia and financing NGOs was "unacceptable."
Ignatchenko said that intelligence services often used NGOs covertly, but added that the British had denied spying against Russia.
However, the FSB spokesman specifically targeted Doe. "We know well that Marc Doe introduced himself as a representative of the Global Opportunities Fund at meetings with NGOs members," he said.
Ignatchenko added that the FSB had detained a Russian citizen who admitted being involved with foreign secret services. His name has not been revealed.
