OSLO, Norway — OSLO, Norway (AP) — A former safety guard on the U.S. Embassy in Norway was convicted of espionage Wednesday after a courtroom in Oslo discovered that he spied for Russia and Iran.
The 28-year-old Norwegian man, whose identify has not been made public, was sentenced to a few years and 7 months behind bars. He had acknowledged the indictment’s info however denied any felony guilt.
Prosecutors stated he handed over particulars concerning the embassy’s diplomats, its ground plans and safety routines, amongst different issues, Norwegian state broadcaster NRK reported. The broadcaster reported that American ties to Israel and the battle in Gaza prompted the person to contact Russia and Iran.
The person’s protection attorneys, in an announcement Thursday, stated the decision raises questions on what is taken into account espionage beneath Norwegian regulation.
“He lied about having safety clearance to brokers from different international locations and exaggerated his personal position,” lawyer Inger Zadig of Elden Regulation Agency stated within the assertion. “He had roughly the identical degree of entry as a janitor on the embassy. The knowledge he shared was nugatory and neither individually nor collectively able to harming people or the safety pursuits of any state.”
The defendant was discovered responsible of 5 espionage-related fees and acquitted of gross corruption. His protection attorneys are weighing whether or not to attraction the decision, whereas prosecutor Carl Fredrik Fari stated his group is contemplating interesting the sentence as a result of the state had requested for greater than six years in jail.
At the time of his arrest final November, the person had been learning for a bachelor’s diploma in safety and preparedness at Norway’s Arctic College, UiT.
It’s a second such case at UiT lately, based on NRK.
One of many individuals the West swapped with Russia in a major prisoner exchange final yr was a UiT visitor researcher who claimed to be a Brazilian named José Assis Giammaria, arrested on espionage allegations in 2022. The police revealed him to be a Russian nationwide by the identify of Mikhail Valeryevich Mikushin.
Norway has a 198-kilometer (123-mile) lengthy border with Russia in the Arctic. Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Norway has closely restricted entry for Russian nationals.
Final yr, the Norwegian authorities stated it was contemplating a plan to build a fence alongside all or a part of its border with Russia.
