Diplomatic security

RUSSIA ACCUSES U.S. INTELLIGENCE OF ATTEMPT TO RECRUIT DIPLOMAT

Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has accused U.S. intelligence services of trying to recruit one of their diplomats abroad, thereby slowing down the procurement of vital cancer drugs for late former prime minister, Yevgeny Primakov.

Speaking during an appearance on Sunday Night with Vladimir Solovey, channel ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova described in detail an alleged encounter between an unnamed Russian diplomat and officials from the U.S. security apparatus.

Zakharova revealed that during Primakov’s battle with liver cancer, a U.S. diplomat attempted to purchase crucial drugs for his treatment, only to be taken aside by U.S. security agents.

Diplomatic security

Gunman shoots, wounds U.S. consular official in Mexico

Mexican prosecutors said Saturday they are searching for a gunman who opened fire on an official of the U.S. Consulate in the western city of Guadalajara.

The Attorney General’s Office said Saturday the official was wounded in the attack Friday in Guadalajara -- and the U.S. Consulate said on its Facebook and Twitter pages that the FBI was offering a $20,000 reward for information on the attacker.  

Guadalajara is the capital of Jalisco state, which is dominated by the hyper-violent Jalisco New Generation cartel. There was no immediate evidence of any cartel link to the attack.  

Diplomatic security

Former MI6 spy chief warns Boris Johnson to be ‘careful’ after Russian Embassy protest remarks

Calling for protests at the Russian Embassy is a risky move, a former head of MI6 has said, warning that Britain should know from experience to be “careful” about the safety of diplomatic staff.

Sir John Sawers, once head of the UK’s external security agency, told the BBC in an extensive interview Wednesday that “we all recall what happened to our embassy in Tehran,” adding that “we need to be careful about the consequences of things we call for,” referring to comments by Tory Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson on Tuesday.

The UK Embassy in Iran was stormed by protestors in 2011.

Johnson appeared to urge protests at the Russian Embassy in London during an emergency debate over the bombing of Aleppo in Syria.

In the same interview, Sawers rejected a no-fly zone over Syria on military grounds, saying it would likely cause a direct clash between Western and Russian forces.

“You cannot have NATO forces or American forces operating in the same theatre as Russian forces without risking a very direct clash between the two,” he warned.

Diplomatic security

Two Russian diplomats expelled after Moscow cop’s tackle of U.S. official

The United States last month expelled two Russian diplomats as a response to a Russian police guard tackling a U.S. diplomat outside the American Embassy in Moscow, the State Department said Friday.

The diplomats were declared persona non grata on June 17, spokesman John Kirby said. That was less than two weeks after the incident that sparked the diplomatic row.

The June 6 scuffle between the police officer and the diplomat was captured on security footage and broadcast on Russian television last week. It shows a man emerging from a taxi and walking briskly up the embassy steps. He is just outside the door when a guard jumps out of a gatehouse and wrestles him to the ground. Even with the patrolman on top of him, the diplomat pushes with his feet and manages while on his back to get inside the door to the embassy, which is U.S. territory and inviolate.

Diplomatic security

When diplomats get punished for doing their jobs

On Oct. 21, 2014, Robin Raphel, a former assistant secretary of state, got an urgent call from her daughter, who said that something had triggered the burglar alarm at home. When Raphel arrived, she found FBI agentssearching her files and other personal materials.

Raphel frantically telephoned her office at the State Department to ask what was happening; colleagues said they had been instructed not to speak with her. Agents were already riffling her desk at State and putting up yellow tape to warn off workmates.

Raphel’s voice still shakes with emotion as she recalls that afternoon. The FBI search warrant said she was being investigated under 18 U.S. Code Section 793(e), a criminal statute that covers illegal gathering or transmission of national-security information and is used in espionage cases. The warrant offered no other details.