Ukraine arrests man suspected of spying for Russia disguised as UN volunteer
Detention comes amid escalating spat between Kyiv and the United Nations.
Ukraine arrested a man for allegedly spying for Russia while impersonating a United Nations volunteer on the front lines, Kyiv’s security service said Monday.
“Disguising himself as a volunteer, the traitor spied on the locations of the Defense Forces [toward] Pokrovsk, where the highest concentration of enemy attacks has been recorded so far,” Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) said in a press release.
The man, described by the security service as 34 years old and working for Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), allegedly pretended to be a local volunteer for the U.N.’s World Food Programme in the Russian-occupied Donetsk region.
Under the pretense of delivering humanitarian aid to local residents, he secretly identified the locations of Ukrainian infantry and artillery positions and transmitted the information to Russia, the SBU said.
Russian forces then used the data to plan new attacks on Pokrovsk, according to the press release, which has been the focus of a long-term assault.
The suspect has been charged with treason under martial law and faces potential life imprisonment and the confiscation of his property.
Ukraine and the U.N. have been at loggerheads since Secretary-General António Guterres appeared at a summit in Russia last week, where he embraced Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin and his Belarusian ally Alexander Lukashenko.
The U.N. food aid organization told POLITICO it was “cooperating” with the Ukrainian probe into the suspected spy.
“WFP is aware that the SBU (Security Service of Ukraine) has detained an individual in the Pokrovsk area (Donetsk region), who identified himself as a humanitarian volunteer working for a cooperating partner of WFP,” the World Food Programme said in a statement Monday evening.
“WFP can confirm that the individual detained is not a WFP employee. The individual however had a contractual relationship with an NGO partner of WFP until August 2024. We are actively cooperating with the authorities in their enquiries,” it added.
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