The opposition Progressive Slovakia (PS) party plans to submit a proposal to amend the Criminal Code at the next session of Parliament with the aim of introducing more severe punishments for the criminal offence of espionage in response to the appointment of new Russian Ambassador to Slovakia Sergey Andreev.
Speaking at a press conference on Tuesday, MP Tomáš Valášek and Peter Bator (both PS) warned that, given his past, Andreev should never have been allowed to become the ambassador to Slovakia.
Valášek considers the ambassador's appointment to be a major failure by the current governing coalition.
Bator pointed to Andreev's previous posting in Poland. "The building of a network of secret agents and collaborators with the Russian intelligence services in Poland, and coordinated propaganda spread by the ambassador himself. What do all these activities have in common? - one person, and that is Sergei Andreev," he said. According to Bator, Andreev's presence in Slovakia poses a threat to state security.
Valášek said that it's reasonable to expect that Andreev will continue the same activities in Slovakia.
"A sovereign foreign policy would never have agreed to this, a sane domestic security policy would never have allowed such an influence operation onto the territory of its own republic, and even a fearful state policy would have been far stricter, because it would perceive the concerns that come with such a person taking up a diplomatic post in Slovakia," stated Bator.
According to him, the government doesn't mind, however, because it's turned Slovakia into fertile ground for the activities of Russian and other foreign intelligence services.
In this context, Progressive Slovakia plans to propose tougher penalties for espionage. Valášek said that while espionage is sufficiently punishable in principle, the justice system fails in practice.
Source: TASR
