Russian Spies Augment Effort to Grab NATO Secrets, Say Western Officials 

Russia’s espionage agencies are redoubling efforts to penetrate NATO, Western intelligence officials say, and are focusing on recruiting moles in the defense ministries of the pact’s member states.

Italy expelled two Russian diplomats this week after they were caught in a parking lot in Rome handing cash to an Italian naval captain in exchange for sensitive military documents, which included NATO files. The 54-year-old Italian naval officer, Walter Biot, had been working at the Italian Ministry of Defense in Rome for a decade and was attached to the policy unit within the office of the Chief of the Defense Staff. According to the Corriere della Sera newspaper, Biot’s unit handled “all confidential and classified documents,” including NATO dossiers. The Carabinieri, one of Italy’s main law enforcement agencies, said Biot, a father of four, was caught “red-handed” exchanging the documents stored on a flash drive and was being detained on “serious crimes linked to spying and state security.”