SOVIETS SPIED ON EMBASSY, FRENCH SAY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201630026-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 20, 2012
• Sequence Number: 26
• Publication Date: April 6, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

ST Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-
ART I CLB APP1UF32
oil PAGL
? Soviets Spied
1.:
On Embassy, .
French Say
By Michael Dobbs
Weehoytoo Post Fore4n Service
PARIS, April 5-Soviet intelli=
gence services secretly bugged
communications equipment at the
French Embassy in Moscow for
I more than five years, according to
official documents obtained by a
leading French news magazine.
The revelations, which are to be
published in next week's edition of
the magazine Le Point, seem likely
to add fuel to a controversy here
over the scale of Kremlin espionage
operations against the West.
A -spate of officially inspired leaks
of intelligence information has ap-
peared in the French news media
during the past week to mark the
second anniversary of the French
government's expulsion of 47 So=;
viet officials in Paris for alleged spy-
mg. The Soviet Embassy here has
protested the leaks to the French
Foreign Ministry.'. :Y .
French journalists hive been told
by contacts in the French' counter-
intelligence service DST that many
documents being - leaked to the
press were supplied by a KGB col-
s oneL The colonel, whose name and
whereabouts are being kept secret,
is reported to have supplied names,
of KGB officers stationed-abroad. ?
The Le Point report said that the
Soviet colonel's. revelations had led
to ? the. expulsion of 148 Soviet of-
ficials worldwide in 1983-a sharp
increase over the 34 expulsions in
1982.
? Le Point published the text, of a
message from the French Embassy
in Moscow to the Foreign Ministry
T in Paris on Jan. 11, 1983,. stating
that electronic bugs had been found
in all of the embassy's teleprinters.
The magazine's intelligence spe-
cialist, Thierry Wolton, said that
the bugging of the teleprinters-
which were installed in the embassy
between October, 1976 and Febru-
ary 1977-meant that the Soviet
secret police, the KGB, had access
"to all the diplomatic messages re-
D P90-00965 R000201630026-5
WASHINGTON POST
6 April 1985
ceived and sent by our embassy in
Moscow, including the most se-
cret." .
A French Foreign Ministry
spokesman refused. to comment on
the magazine's allegations.
Soviet intelligence documents
published by Le Monde and the gov-
ernment-owned television channel
TF1 earlier this week suggested
that 65 percent of the western
technological secrets stolen by So-
viet spies were of U.S. origin and
that 8 percent were French. .
A French translation of one of the
documents, signed by Leonid Smir-
nov, head of the Soviet Military In-
dustrial Commission, claimed that
the Soviets had succeeded in finding
I ways 't'o-jam-
o jam the U.S. antitank
guided missile system known as
ly in the electronics and space sec-
tors-had been selected as possible
targets by the KGB.
Political analysts here believe
that the sudden spate of leaks could
be designed as a warning to, the So-
viet Union against resuming inten-
sive espionage operations in
France. They also note that the
leaks support the claims of Presi-
dent Francois Mitterrand to have
taken a tougher line with Moscow
than his conservative predecessors.
TOW, or "tube-launched, optically
tracked, wire-guided" missile. TOW
was used by NATO forces in West-
ern Europe to counter the Warsaw
Pact's numerical advantage.. in
tanks.
Last night TF1 broadcast a tele-'
vision documentary in- which a
French counterintelligence officer
was seen quoting passages from the
document, which was described as a
summary of Soviet industrial espi-
onage activities in 1979-82. The
document said that construction of
both the Soviet MiG29 and Su27
fighter planes had been assisted by
western technologies.
Smirnov, who is a Soviet deputy
premier, was quoted as praising the
work of Soviet "special services" in:
carrying out their work abroad. But
1 e criticized delays in "analyzing the
documents" and other bureaucratic
problems.
i-t The French intelligence officer,
[.`whose name was not given, _ said
1. that 244 French firms-particular-
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201630026-5
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