U.S. Embassy: So called spies worked in contact with Belarusian Ministry of Internal Affairs

Jonathan Moore, U.S. Chargé d’Affaires in Belarus, refutes the accusations of espionage against staff of the embassy, sounded on the Belarusian TV.

A part of U.S. embassy in Belarus staff will leave the territory of the country. So Washington meets the demands of the official Minsk to cut size of American diplomats on parity basis. As Jonathan Moore, U.S. Chargé d’Affaires in Belarus, said to BelaPAN, he had a meeting in the Belarusian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the morning of 24 March, where he announced the decision of Washington to reduce U.S. embassy staff.

“The Belarusian side has said 24 March (till 3.00pm) is a deadline for taking the decision,” J. Moore said. “With regret and assurance this demand doesn’t meet the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, the United States has taken a decision on cutting the embassy staff.”

Jonathan Moore said 17 persons would continue to work for the diplomatic mission. The same number of people would leave Belarus.

The diplomat reminded the U.S. embassy had to suspend temporally visa issuing to Belarusian citizens due to the demand of the Belarusian side to reduce embassy staff.

J. Moore emphasised that this measure was temporal. According to him, the embassy had to resort to these measures, as their efforts are focused on the staff to be able to leave Belarus on time. He stressed the embassy was ready to issue visas to Belarusians in urgent cases, and expressed hope the consular section would work in normal mode from the next week.

J. Moore said the Belarusian authorities insisted on reducing embassy staff, but they expected the number of visas issued would remain the same. They embassy is trying to settle this situation now.

The Belarusian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has said to the diplomat that Ambassador Karen Stewart won’t be able to come to Minsk until Belarusian Ambassador Mikhail Khvastou returns to the U.S. Jonathan Moor noted the United States were waiting for Ambassador Khvastou to return at any moment.

But the news on reducing staff of the U.S. diplomatic mission wasn’t the main one in the Belarus-U.S. cold war. A spy detail has appeared in the mosaic the conflict.

As the Belarusian TV (BT) reported a U.S. espionage network had been uncovered in Belarus. It was organised by the U.S. diplomatic mission and consisted of Belarusian citizens. The recruited by America Belarusians collected interesting for the States information and passed it to the embassy to a FBI agent. The TV report named two embassy officers - Bernard Nixon and Curt Finley. A secret address of the spy ring was situated near the embassy.

According to the BT, the detention took place on 13 March. Moreover, a U.S. supervisor was present at the “spy meeting.”

The TV item noted the task of the group was to collect and pass to the American side the data for the use to the detriment of Belarus. The group was equipped with photo cameras, binoculars, video cameras and telephones.

Jonathan Moor in the interview to BelaPAN refutes the accusations of espionage against officers of the embassy. “We have no spies operating in Belarus,” the diplomat said.

J. Moore said these people were part of the embassy’s security service. They had contacts with the Belarusian militia and the Ministry of Internal Affairs as part of their duties. It’s a common practise to have such people in U.S. embassy staff. He stressed that Bernard Nixon had left Belarus July 2007 and Kurt Finley was expected to leave the country together with other embassy officers due to staff cuts till 27 March.

Jonathan Moore also said neither B. Nixon nor K. Finley were FBI agents. He explained they were part of the diplomatic security service, which was a part of the Department of State. FBI officers who work with U.S. embassies abroad usually hold the position of legal attaché, but the embassy in Minsk has no such position, he explained. A legal attaché for this region works in Kyiv. He visited Minsk, had meetings including those with representatives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. So, the Belarusian authorities are well informed about the real state of things.

The diplomat also noted that the U.S. embassy had provided a list of all Belarusians working with the embassy to the country’s foreign ministry. J. Moore stressed there was no secret or conspiracy.