BRITISH DISCIPLINE FIVE ON SPY'S LIST

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000505220005-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 26, 2010
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: January 18, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/08/26: CIA-RDP90-00552R
WASHINGTON TIMES
18 JANUARY 1983
British discipline
live on spy's
LONDON (AP) - Five workers
at Britain's top secret intelligence
center who were earmarked as
potential blackmail targets by a
Soviet spy have been disciplined
and demoted, British newspapers
reported yesterday.
The five were co-workers of con-
victed spy Geoffrey Prime, once a
Russian-language translator at the
Government Communications
Headquarters at Cheltenham, 90
miles northwest of London,
according to reports in the London
Times, the Daily Telegraph and
the Guardian.
Agents of MIS, Britain's
counter-intelligence service,
reportedly have been looking for
additional Soviet spies at the elec-
tronic intelligence gathering cen-
ter since Prime's arrest last year.
Officials are said to be
convinced Prime left at least one
such "mole" in place before he quit
his job at the center in 1977.
While working at' Cheltenham,
Prime acted as a "talent spotter"
for the Soviets and drew up
detailed lists of potential black-
mail targets among his fellow
workers, the press reports said.
They said a "considerable num-
ber" of Prime's files had been
recovered, containing "hundreds
of personal facts about his col-
leagues:'
Those named, the newspapers
said, have been interviewed by offi-
cers from M1S and the intelligence
center's own security division.` :. '
Five of those ' interrogated
reportedly were disciplined and
demoted "because they were not
entirely frank when questioned."
The reports said the interviews
were carried out to ,see if those
named by Prime "had been put
under any pressure by the Rus-
sians."
The five demoted workers had
"tried to cover-up certain personal
details which they did not know
their interrogators were aware of
asa result of Prime's information:"
There was no immediate official
comment on the reports, which did
not say what the demoted employ-
ees' jobs were.
Prime was sentenced to 35
years' imprisonment last Nov ~10
after being convicted of spying for
the Soviets in what was.called the
most damaging penetration of
Western intelligence since Worid
War II.
Prime, 44, admitted he had spied
for Moscow for 14 years, the last
two at the Cheltenham headquar.
ters.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/08/26: CIA-RDP90-00552R000505220005-4