Agents, secret service, espionage: When you hear these words, you think of James Bond, wild chases or mortal danger.
The espionage trial in Munich involves three USB sticks, Wikipedia articles and meetings in Augsburg burger restaurants.
Munich – He is said to have worked at the university and spied for the Russian secret service: In a espionage trial before the Higher Regional Court (OLG) in Munich, however, the accused denied any intention.
"I'm not an agent," said the Russian, who will work as a scientist at the University of Augsburg until 2021, at the start of the process.
"The last eight months were just a horror for me." He could now "cross out his whole life," he said.
"My life, my career, everything is gone."
The 30-year-old is accused of acting as a secret service agent, because of cooperation with the "secret service of a foreign power", as the indictment says.
The federal prosecutor assumes that the Russian secret service primarily wanted to get information about the European launch vehicle Ariane.
According to the indictment, the man gave an employee of the Russian Consulate General in Munich several scientific articles that were publicly available on the Internet for a total of 2,500 euros.
In part, he used a university account to pull the articles onto USB sticks.
The meetings to hand over the sticks took place in various burger and steak restaurants in Augsburg.
Munich: scientists are said to have spied for the Russians
The 30-year-old does not deny that.
However, he did not know that the employee at the time, to whom, according to the federal prosecutor's office, he is said to have given information, was an employee of the secret service.
And he never spoke to him about his own work at the university.
"I never considered that he could be an employee of an agent organization," said the defendant.
“Nobody asked me if I wanted to work for a secret organization.
If someone asked me about it - I would immediately say no."
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A scientist from the University of Augsburg is said to have passed on information about Ariane rockets - seen here during a launch in French Guiana - to the Russian secret service.
© S Martin/ARIANESPACE/epa/dpa
The accused was arrested in June 2021, and almost at the same time an employee of the Russian Consulate General in Munich was expelled and declared "persona non grata" - an undesirable person.
When asked, the Federal Foreign Office did not want to comment on whether the expelled diplomat was the contact person of the accused.
Trial in Munich: The accused is said to have been a diplomat only for appearances
The "Spiegel" reported in January, citing "people familiar with the process", that the man was only supposedly accredited as a diplomat, but was actually a full-time employee of the Russian foreign intelligence service SWR.
He was exposed as part of an investigation by the Attorney General.
The Federal Foreign Office also did not comment on the question of whether this was the case that was being heard before the Munich court.
He cannot imagine that the Russian secret service would be interested in information that is publicly available anyway.
Articles about the Ariane rocket can be found at "Wikipedia".
He met the diplomat by chance on a trip with friends.
Afterwards they had arranged to meet for a beer, during which the man from the consulate reported on an acquaintance who wanted to invest in aviation projects.
In a brief statement, the defendant's lawyer stressed that the information provided by his client was not confidential.
"He's only here because he copied scientific articles and reports that were available to everyone onto sticks," he said.
The accusation of the prosecution seems "strangely outdated in times of cybercrime and in times of the Internet".
Because: "One can confidently assume that the Russian intelligence service also has an Internet connection."
Espionage cases rarely end up in court.
According to the Bavarian Ministry of Justice, between 2016 and 2020 only one suspect was convicted in the area of classic espionage (in contrast to industrial espionage) in the Free State - namely in 2018.
Even the Federal Prosecutor's Office, which - as in the Munich case - brings outstanding cases to courts all over Germany, has only counted a little more than a handful of indictments in recent years.
According to the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution in 2020, espionage activities in Germany have at least reached the level of the Cold War.
The Federal Republic is an attractive target, especially for agents from Russia, China, Iran and Turkey, said the head of the Federal Office, Thomas Haldenwang, in the Bundestag in 2020.
