Latest news with #doubleagent
Daily Mail
5 hours ago
- Daily Mail
Britain's spies spent 20 years hunting a Russian double agent at the heart of MI6 in extraordinary global operation - and they could STILL be spying for Putin
British spies spent up to 20 years hunting a senior officer at the heart of MI6 over fears he was a Russian double agent in an extraordinary global operation. Operation Wedlock, run by MI5, saw a team of up to 35 surveillance, planning and desk officers travelling globally in a bid to catch the alleged mole, the Guardian has reported. The 'highly unusual' investigation, believed to have began in the mid-to-late 1990s before concluding in 2015, came following a tip-off from the CIA about an alleged spy. Fears had been raised that a British intelligence official could be working in London and relaying confidential information to Russia. In one particularly dangerous instance, an entire surveillance team reportedly travelled to the Middle East for more than a week, with officers sheltering in a CIA safe house. It is understood that such trip could have violated international law as the undercover officers had travelled to the country without the permission or knowledge of its own government. According to The Guardian, agents were warned that if detained, they were 'on their own' and would not receive assistance. But despite their best efforts, the specialist intelligence agency never obtained any 'conclusive proof' of a mole, meaning that there is a possibility the double agent could still be spying for Russia today. One source told the publication: '[We were told] the target was a Russian spy … The US believed he was leaking information to the Russians. He was suspect 1A. The job was taken more seriously than any other [MI5] was involved in. Wedlock eclipsed them all.' Meanwhile, another source spoke of fears amid the the organisation that they had 'another Philby on our hands', a reference to notorious MI6 double agent Kim Philby. The former Cambridge student was recruited by the Soviet Union in 1963 and eventually forced to flee to Moscow. They added that the surveillance team, based in Wandsworth, south London and working under the name of a fake security business, believed that the man was being assisted by two other individuals, also based in London. Due to the sensitivity of the probe, the officer in charge was also allegedly briefed about the task during a church. Describing the operation as 'highly unusual', the source added it was 'the longest in recent memory and probably the most expensive'. MI5's technical operations team, known as A1 at the time, are said to have broken into the alleged spy's home and planted listening and video devices. Meanwhile, an MI5 car, fitted with a camera inside of a tissue box, was also reportedly set up outside of the target's property. Vladimir Putin was running Russia's secret intelligence service, t he FSB, at one point during the lengthy investigation. In May, 'The Spy in the Archive', a new biography of Vasily Mitrokhin by Gordon Corera, was released. The former KGB agent, who defected to Britain in 1992, provided MI6 with a significant archive of KGB documents, alongside revealing Soviet espionage activities and operations However the close source warned that the success of the operation was insignificant due to a lack of evidence, with there still a strong possibility that the double agent could be at large. They added: 'MI5 never got the conclusive proof it was looking for. They said that if it was not him, then potentially MI6 "still has a mole to find"'. A Whitehall source declined to comment. In January 1963, infamous double agent Philby confessed to MI6 officer Nicholas Elliott that he had been working for the Russians since the 1930s. However, he lied about breaking off contact in 1946 and claimed fellow Cambridge spy Anthony Blunt would never work for the Russians. Philby, who died in 1988, told Mr Elliott at the time: 'Here's the scoop, as it were. I have had this particular moment in mind for 28 years almost, that conclusive proof would come out.' He then said he had a choice 'between suicide and prosecution', adding: 'This is not in any sense blackmail, but a statement of the alternatives before me.' He admitted betraying Konstantin Volkov, a KGB officer who tried to defect to the West, bringing with him details of traitors operating in British intelligence and the Foreign Office. This would have led to Philby's exposure. Instead, as a result of Philby's intervention, he was abducted by the Russians in Istanbul and executed. First falling under suspicion after fellow Cambridge spies, Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess, fled to Russia in 1951, he initially managed to dodge MI5 interrogators who said he was an 'enigma'. He described his life in MI6 as a time of 'controlled schizophrenia', adding: 'I really did feel a tremendous loyalty to MI6, I was treated very, very well in it and I made some really marvellous friends there. But the over-ruling inspiration was the other side.' In May, 'The Spy in the Archive', a new biography of Vasily Mitrokhin by Gordon Corera, was released. The former KGB agent, who defected to Britain in 1992, provided MI6 with a significant archive of KGB documents, alongside revealing Soviet espionage activities and operations. Meanwhile in April, the British public were granted access for the first time to see the suitcases and passport of one of the members of the notorious Cambridge Spy ring at the National Archives. British diplomat and Soviet double agent Guy Burgess defected to Russia on May 25, 1951, leaving behind two briefcases at a private member's club in Pall Mall. Burgess left strict instructions with staff at the Reform Club that the leather cases, one locked and another stuffed with letters, papers and photographs, should be left for Anthony Blunt, a fellow Soviet spy who was able to dispose of any incriminating papers before handing over the briefcases to MI5 when the defection emerged. Now, in an exhibition that explores MI5's 115-year history running until September 28, amateur sleuths can see a key piece of spy history as Burgess' briefcase is displayed.
The Sun
16 hours ago
- Politics
- The Sun
Spy chiefs probed ‘Russian double agent' at the heart of MI6 in huge 20-year global operation – and never caught ‘mole'
SPY chiefs probed a suspected "Russian double agent" at the heart of MI6 in a 20-year global operation. An investigation launched into the alleged mole, dubbed Operation Wedlock, sent surveillance officers around the world. 6 6 6 It included a team of over 30 MI5 officers, as reported by the Guardian, whose work spanned up to two decades. One on occasion, they were sent to the Middle East and sheltered in a CIA safe house. It is understood they were sent on the mission under terms that would have been illegal according to international law. Despite their work, MI5 were unable to conclude whether there had been a mole spying for Russia. A source told the Guardian: "We thought we had another Philby on our hands". Kim Philby was a prominent member of the notorious Cambridge Five, a ring of spies who passed information to the Soviet Union. With fascism plaguing Europe, Philby headed for Austria where he became active in helping the oppressed working class socialists. Alongside his wife, Jewish socialist Litzi Friedmann, the couple helped the anti-fascist cause in Vienna but later fled to London to escape the Nazis. Philby's life changed when he was introduced to a resident Soviet agent, code-named "Otto", at Regents Park. Along with four other Cambridge students, they were persuaded to start double lives as spies for the Soviets. Through the help of the KGB they worked their way into government jobs and passed on state secrets to the Russians. Philby was so good at his job he even secured a high-level job with MI6. In 1949 he was sent to Washington where be became a liaison intelligence officer 'combating Soviet subversion in Western Europe'. However, after two members of the Cambridge Five defected, suspicion grew over Philby and he resigned from the Foreign Office. Cleared of treason allegations, MI6 posted him to Beirut, where he worked as a correspondent for The Observer. In 1962, his cover was blown during a conversation with a MI5 officer at a party and he later made a 'sham' confession to be granted immunity. A year later a KGB guide smuggled him into Russia where he lived out the remainder of his life and was treated as a 'hero'. MI6 is the intelligence agency which supplies the Government with foreign intelligence (as opposed to MI5 which deals with domestic security threats). Its existence was not formally acknowledged until 1994. It is regarded as one of the best spy agencies in the world. Describing its work on its official website, the agency says: 'Our mission is to provide Her Majesty's Government with a global covert capability. 'We collect secret intelligence and mount operations overseas to prevent and detect serious crime, and promote and defend the national security and economic wellbeing of the United Kingdom.' Meanwhile, MI5 is widely understood to focus its intelligence efforts inside the UK but that isn't always the case. With threats to Britain's security often coming from abroad, the agency says it does "work outside the UK where it's necessary to protect the UK's national security or to counter security threats". It describes itself as a "publicly accountable civilian intelligence organisation", not a "secret police force", as it does not have the power to arrest people. Reporting to the Home Office, it was formed in 1909 under British army captain Vernon Kell to identify and counteract German spies in the country, according to the Britannica. The MI5 probe into an alleged mole was sparked in the 1990s and continued to at least 2015. It was launched after a tip off from the CIA in America, where they believed a British intelligence officer was working for Russia. Vladimir Putin was in charge of the FSB, Russia's secret intelligence service, at one point in the investigation. A source said: '[We were told] the target was a Russian spy. The US believed he was leaking information to the Russians. "He was suspect 1A. The job was taken more seriously than any other [MI5] was involved in. Wedlock eclipsed them all.' As reported by the Guardian, it has been revealed the UK believed they had identified the alleged spy. MI5 specialists were put in charge of tracking him down, although they did not operate from the Westminster HQ. The mission was so top secret, one insider claimed the officer in charge was briefed about the task in a church. Instead, the team were based in Wandsworth, south London, which was near an MI6 base. The officers were told the suspected mole held a senior role at MI6 and listening devices were planted inside his home, as well as secret cameras. He was tracked across the world, with officers travelling as far as Asia and the Middle East. The agents were given authentic passports, but fake names, and told they would be "on their own" if caught. A source also claimed the suspect was not thought to have been working by himself, but aided by two other people. The insider added how Wedlock was a 'highly unusual operation, the longest in recent memory and probably the most expensive'. 'MI5 never got the conclusive proof it was looking for,' they added, and MI6 "still [potentially] has a mole to find". 6 6 6
The Guardian
a day ago
- Politics
- The Guardian
UK launched huge operation to find suspected Russian double agent in MI6
Britain's spy chiefs were forced to launch one of the most sensitive and risky investigations since the cold war over fears a senior officer at the foreign intelligence service MI6 was a double agent for Russia. The extensive hunt for the alleged mole, called Operation Wedlock, was run by MI6's sister agency, MI5, which deployed a team of up to 35 surveillance, planning and desk officers, who travelled across the world. One trip took an entire surveillance team to the Middle East for more than a week, the Guardian has been told, where the officers were put up in a CIA safe house. This trip was particularly hazardous, it's understood, because the officers travelled to the country without the knowledge of its government, and would have been illegal under international law. The investigation is believed to have lasted in one form or another for up to 20 years, but MI5 could not establish whether British intelligence had a mole – raising the possibility that an agent may have got away with spying for Russia. 'We thought we had another Philby on our hands,' said a source, referring to Kim Philby, the infamous MI6 double agent who was part of a group of Britons recruited by the Soviet Union, known as the Cambridge spy ring. MI6, the Secret Intelligence Service, is the UK spy agency responsible for overseas intelligence collection and agent handling; MI5, the Security Service, is the domestic intelligence agency that assesses threats to Britain's national security. The MI5 investigation began in the 1990s and is understood to have continued until at least 2015. By then, the officer being targeted by the Wedlock team had left MI6, which employed a staff of 2,500 at the time. The tipoff about the alleged spy came from the CIA in the US, which was convinced a British intelligence official who was working in London had been relaying secrets to Russia. During part of the investigation, Russia's secret intelligence service, the FSB, was being run by Vladimir Putin. A source with close knowledge of the operation said: '[We were told] the target was a Russian spy … The US believed he was leaking information to the Russians. He was suspect 1A. The job was taken more seriously than any other [MI5] was involved in. Wedlock eclipsed them all.' The operation began in the mid-to-late 1990s after the CIA told its counterparts in British intelligence about its concerns. A recently published book, The Spy in the Archive: How One Man Tried to Kill the KGB, by the former BBC security correspondent Gordon Corera, references the episode. The book says the CIA was concerned that an MI6 officer had been 'turned by Moscow', but that it was unclear who it was. The Guardian has discovered that the UK identified the alleged spy and a team of MI5 specialists was tasked with following him. The team did not operate from MI5 headquarters at Thames House in Westminster. Such was the sensitivity, the officer who led the surveillance was briefed about the operation in a church, according to a source. Some of those selected to be involved in the operation were initially told they were going on a training exercise, and were only given the terms of reference when they were outside Thames House. The Wedlock surveillance team was based in a building in Wandsworth, south London – close to MI6's riverside building in Vauxhall. The officers operated there under the name of a fake security business. At the time, the team was told the target had a senior role at MI6 with access to a wide range of highly sensitive material. MI5's technical operations team, known then as A1, covertly broke into the MI6 officer's home and planted listening and video devices. A live feed beamed images back to an operations room. Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion An MI5 car outside his house was fitted with a camera inside a tissue box on the ledge behind the back seats, a source said. The extensive surveillance highlighted some conduct that raised cause for concern, but this was unrelated to spying, the Guardian has been told. During the course of the operation, surveillance teams tracked his movements abroad, following him to cities across Europe, Asia and the Middle East, a very high-risk move as the team was operating outside MI5's jurisdiction. The Guardian has been told the team was sent into a country with real passports under false names, with the agents warned that if they were detained for any reason, they were 'on their own … we can't help you'. Such was the concern about the alleged mole, intelligence chiefs considered they had no choice. The man being surveilled was not thought to be working alone, a source said. Two other people, also based in London, were thought to be helping him. The source said Wedlock was a 'highly unusual operation … the longest in recent memory and probably the most expensive'. To have one UK intelligence agency in effect spying on another was extraordinary, the source said. 'MI5 never got the conclusive proof it was looking for,' they added. They said that if it was not him, then potentially MI6 'still has a mole to find'. One concern among those who worked on the operation was that the target, a specialist himself, might have become aware he was being watched. A Whitehall source declined to comment. The best public interest journalism relies on first-hand accounts from people in the know. If you have something to share on this subject you can contact us confidentially using the following methods. Secure Messaging in the Guardian app The Guardian app has a tool to send tips about stories. Messages are end to end encrypted and concealed within the routine activity that every Guardian mobile app performs. This prevents an observer from knowing that you are communicating with us at all, let alone what is being said. If you don't already have the Guardian app, download it (iOS/Android) and go to the menu. Select 'Secure Messaging'. SecureDrop, instant messengers, email, telephone and post See our guide at for alternative methods and the pros and cons of each.
The Guardian
a day ago
- Politics
- The Guardian
UK launched huge operation to find suspected Russian double agent in MI6
Britain's spy chiefs were forced to launch one of the most sensitive and risky investigations since the cold war over fears a senior officer at the foreign intelligence service MI6 was a double agent for Russia. The extensive hunt for the alleged mole, called Operation Wedlock, was run by MI6's sister agency, MI5, which deployed a team of up to 35 surveillance, planning and desk officers, who travelled across the world. One trip took an entire surveillance team to the Middle East for more than a week, the Guardian has been told, where the officers were put up in a CIA safe house. This trip was particularly hazardous, it's understood, because the officers travelled to the country without the knowledge of its government, and would have been illegal under international law. The investigation is believed to have lasted in one form or another for up to 20 years, but MI5 could not establish whether British intelligence had a mole – raising the possibility that an agent may have got away with spying for Russia. 'We thought we had another Philby on our hands,' said a source, referring to Kim Philby, the infamous MI6 double agent who was part of a group of Britons recruited by the Soviet Union, known as the Cambridge spy ring. MI6, the Secret Intelligence Service, is the UK spy agency responsible for overseas intelligence collection and agent handling; MI5, the Security Service, is the domestic intelligence agency that assesses threats to Britain's national security. The MI5 investigation began in the 1990s and is understood to have continued until at least 2015. By then, the officer being targeted by the Wedlock team had left MI6, which employed a staff of 2,500 at the time. The tipoff about the alleged spy came from the CIA in the US, which was convinced a British intelligence official who was working in London had been relaying secrets to Russia. During part of the investigation, Russia's secret intelligence service, the FSB, was being run by Vladimir Putin. A source with close knowledge of the operation said: '[We were told] the target was a Russian spy … The US believed he was leaking information to the Russians. He was suspect 1A. The job was taken more seriously than any other [MI5] was involved in. Wedlock eclipsed them all.' The operation began in the mid-to-late 1990s after the CIA told its counterparts in British intelligence about its concerns. A recently published book, The Spy in the Archive: How One Man Tried to Kill the KGB, by the former BBC security correspondent Gordon Corera, references the episode. The book says the CIA was concerned that an MI6 officer had been 'turned by Moscow', but that it was unclear who it was. The Guardian has discovered that the UK identified the alleged spy and a team of MI5 specialists was tasked with following him. The team did not operate from MI5 headquarters at Thames House in Westminster. Such was the sensitivity, the officer who led the surveillance was briefed about the operation in a church, according to a source. Some of those selected to be involved in the operation were initially told they were going on a training exercise, and were only given the terms of reference when they were outside Thames House. The Wedlock surveillance team was based in a building in Wandsworth, south London – close to MI6's riverside building in Vauxhall. The officers operated there under the name of a fake security business. Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion At the time, the team was told the target had a senior role at MI6 with access to a wide range of highly sensitive material. MI5's technical operations team, known then as A1, covertly broke into the MI6 officer's home and planted listening and video devices. A live feed beamed images back to an operations room. An MI5 car outside his house was fitted with a camera inside a tissue box on the ledge behind the back seats, a source said. The extensive surveillance highlighted some conduct that raised cause for concern, but this was unrelated to spying, the Guardian has been told. During the course of the operation, surveillance teams tracked his movements abroad, following him to cities across Europe, Asia and the Middle East, a very high-risk move as the team was operating outside MI5's jurisdiction. The Guardian has been told the team was sent into a country with real passports under false names, with the agents warned that if they were detained for any reason, they were 'on their own … we can't help you'. Such was the concern about the alleged mole, intelligence chiefs considered they had no choice. The man being surveilled was not thought to be working alone, a source said. Two other people, also based in London, were thought to be helping him. The source said Wedlock was a 'highly unusual operation … the longest in recent memory and probably the most expensive'. To have one UK intelligence agency in effect spying on another was extraordinary, the source said. 'MI5 never got the conclusive proof it was looking for,' they added. They said that if it was not him, then potentially MI6 'still has a mole to find'. One concern among those who worked on the operation was that the target, a specialist himself, became aware he was being watched. A Whitehall source declined to comment.
The Independent
16-06-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Finally, MI6 has appointed a female chief – women have long been espionage's secret weapon
It has been 15 years since I returned to Moscow for The Independent. Back then, I was a twentysomething writer, coming to terms with my father's death and the many questions about his life that remained unanswered. Among them, what was the impact of learning via a newspaper headline, at the age of 19, that his own father, Kim Philby, was a double agent? As I trudged along Moscow's grey, snow-covered streets for the first time since I was a child, tracing my grandfather's footsteps through the city to which he absconded after being unmasked as the Third Man in the Cambridge Spy ring, I found ever more questions opening up in my mind. Among them: where were all the women? In the many books, plays and films I had encountered over the years about my grandfather's life and those he worked with as a Soviet mole, all the stories seemed to be about the men. MI6, the UK's foreign intelligence service, has only announced its first female chief today, with the appointment of Blaise Metreweli. There were a few female faces, granted, but these were generally the secretaries or the wives – like Kim's fourth wife, Rufina (or Rufa, as we knew her), who spoke tearfully about her late husband as we sat side-by-side on the same sofa that was there when my parents and I visited in the 1980's, in the apartment Kim was given after arriving in the Soviet Union on a tanker from Beirut. Listening to Rufa – who some say was given to Kim as a reward and a distraction once he arrived behind the Iron Curtain, others that she was placed there by the KGB to keep an eye on him – it was impossible not to wonder about her true part in his story. It was equally impossible to expect I'd ever find out. Women spies have played some of the most important, and varied, roles in espionage throughout the ages, as I discovered in researching my new narrative non-fiction book for readers young and old. The Secret Lives of Women Spies is a collection of stories bringing to life the riveting private world of female spies from the 19th century until present day. From armed scout for the Union Army, Harriet Tubman, through to Zandra Flemister, the first black woman to serve in the Secret Service, or the likes of Special Operations Executive agent Noor Inayat Khan, Russian 'illegal' Anna Chapman and eccentric US performer turned star of the French Resistance Josephine Baker, the 20 or so women (and girls) featured here operated in all parts of the spy-world, risking everything for what they believed in – their actions making make them heroes to some and traitors to others. As well as telling their astonishing personal stories, the book explores their historical contexts in an attempt to understand their choices. Some, like Indian National Intelligence officer Saraswathi Rajamani, who at the age of 10 told Mahatma Gandhi, 'When I grow up, I'm going to shoot an Englishman', are straightforward. Others, like that of Mata Hari, whose legend as a German agent using her powers of seduction has been undermined as a new vision emerges of a disempowered woman doing everything she could to be reunited with the daughter taken from her by an abusive husband, are less so. In recent years, there has been a drive towards more transparency, and diversity in the British intelligence game. Under the directorship of Dame Stella Rimington – appointed in 1992, the first of two female MI5 chiefs, followed in 2002 by Eliza Manningham-Buller – ordered that the domestic security service must release files to the National Archive after a certain period of time. It was thanks to the release of a bundle of papers under this protocol in 2015 that it became clear an Austrian woman named Edith Tudor-Hart, also a brilliant photographer and devoted single mother to a mentally-ill son, had been the person responsible for my grandfather's recruitment by the Soviets in the 1930s. Tudor-Hart was in fact so important that Cambridge spy (and relative of the Queen) Anthony Blunt referred to her under interrogation as 'The grandmother of us all'. Interestingly, it was another woman – MI5's first female officer, Jane Sissmore – who first tried to out Kim as a Soviet mole, though following a row with the acting director general, she was fired for insubordination before she could amass the necessary intelligence to prove her claim. Women were not regularly recruited as intelligence officers in MI5 or MI6 until the late 1970s. In a recent interview with Harper's Bazaar, Dame Stella Rimington said: 'When I first joined MI5 [in 1969], the women did the support work and the men did the 'finding things out'.' Dame Stella and a group of disgruntled women employees got together and wrote a group letter demanding better assignments. Her first test was to go into a pub and find out as much as she could about a person without attracting attention. 'I practically got thrown out under suspicion of soliciting!' she added. Indeed, when Vernon Kell co-founded MI6's precursor in 1909, he described his ideal recruits as men 'who could make notes on their shirt cuff while riding on horseback'. Until now a woman has still never been at the helm of the UK's foreign intelligence service, MI6. But that has now all changed. As Richard Moore stands down this year as chief of the UK Secret Intelligence Service, the government has now named Blaise Metreweli, a career intelligence officer, as his replacement. Metreweli, 47, who is currently MI6's head of technology, known as "Q", joined the Secret Intelligence Service in 1999, and has spent most of her career in operational roles in the Middle East and Europe, and will now become the first female hed of the Secret Intelligence Service. Three of the top four jobs in the agency are already occupied by women, who gave an extensive group interview to the FT in 2022. In it, the director of operations, who grew up in the northwest of England and attended a grammar school, is quoted as saying being a woman can 'be a secret sauce … When you're playing into a culture which is particularly male-dominated, women tend to be underestimated and therefore perceived as less threatening.' It is little wonder, then, that a woman has now been appointed as the new Head of MI6. Why spy stories about women remain largely untold is hard to say. Perhaps it's because books about spying have mostly been written by men. Or maybe it's because female spies have rarely been caught? Part of the magic of women spies is the ability of the wife or mother or secretary to disappear into the background, unsuspected. The first female spy I ever read about was a woman called Ursula Kuczynski, also known as Agent Sonya, a Soviet spymaster awarded two orders of the red banner for services to the Soviet Union, who was all but dismissed by the British as a mere housewife. It was in 2014 that I first learnt about Agent Sonya in my interview for this paper with 'the spy-catcher of Fleet Street', journalist Chapman Pincher, shortly before his death. In his study, he unveiled his prize possession, a slide enlarger which belonged to the sister of 'Sonya'. He told me, '[Bridgette Kuczynski] was responsible for a lot more than people know.' As part of a recruitment drive to bring more women into the secret intelligence services, that same year, an MI6 officer explained, anonymously, how being a mother and a spy can be an advantage in more ways than one, 'because it enables you to connect with a whole range of people from terrorists to political leaders … I'm less of a threat than a single female,' said the intelligence officer who was married with young children. 'They [the terrorists] have mothers, sisters, daughters.' In writing this book, many questions have been answered, while others – inevitably – remain. One thing is for sure, the absence of women in popular accounts teaches us as much about how we have thought and talked about history, over the years, because of who gets to record it. But that, thankfully, is changing. Recent historians, including Shrabani Basu, Clare Mulley, Amy Butler Greenfield, Anne Sebba, Claire Hubbard-Hall and Dr Helen Fry, are helping to reframe the narrative, writing the women back into the story – shining a spotlight on those who hid in the shadows and deserve to stand in the light.
