By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : Russian counter-intelligence exposed 199 foreign spies in 2011, said President Dmitry Medvedev Tuesday.
It proves that “activity of [foreign] intelligence services is not decreasing”, Medvedev said.
The list included 41 professional spies and 158 agents in the pay of foreign spymasters, said Medvedev during a meeting with the staff of the Federal Security Service (FSB).
Though the president did not elaborate on the spies’ native countries, he said some of the agents were Russian nationals.
Medvedev also urged the FSB to devote more effort to combat industrial espionage against Russian enterprises. He, however, did not name any industries or companies targeted.
The FSB also prevented 94 “crimes of a terrorist nature,” including eight terrorist attacks, in 2011, said Medvedev while conceding the number of such attacks was not decreasing.
The agency reported foiling a plan to dispatch a suicide bomber to downtown Moscow on New Year’s Eve, but failed to prevent a similar attack in Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport in January 2011, when 37 were killed in the blast.