State-backed espionage in Britain is at its worst because the Cold War: Counter-terror commander’s warning after Putin spy ring was dismantled

State-backed espionage in Britain is at its worst since the Cold War, a counter-terror commander has warned after a cell was convicted of spying for Russia.

Six Bulgarians face lengthy prison sentences after sending secrets to the Kremlin’s intelligence services for almost three years, tailing opponents of the state and spying on a US airbase.

A fifth of British counter-terror policing is now dedicated to battling a surge of state-backed threats at levels not seen in decades, Scotland Yard commander Dominic Murphy said.

Speaking exclusively to the Trial+ podcast, he said: ‘This is the Russian state using proxies hired or tasked to conduct espionage activity in the United Kingdom, something that we’re probably not used to as a challenge for us since the Cold War, but really is now a very real challenge for everything we do.

‘Certainly it [presents the biggest challenge] for counterterrorism policing since the Cold War.’

Counter-terror policing has had to adapt to the threats posed by national security espionage from Russia and other hostile states, the Scotland Yard commander added.

‘We’ve disrupted lethal threat plots in the United Kingdom by the Iranian state as well over the last couple of years,’ he said.

‘And so we continue to see investigations into a broad range of challenges here. But in this case, clearly, Russia was tasking this group of individuals, largely from Bulgaria, to conduct this activity here.’

Vanya Gaberova, 30, has been found guilty of spying for Russia at the Old Bailey 

Decorator Tihomir Ivanchev, 39, (left) and Orlin Roussev, 46, (right) were both accused of being part of the ring. Roussev pled guilty at an earlier date

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Beautician Vanya Gaberova, 30, decorator Tihomir Ivanchev, 39, and lab technician Katrin Ivanova, 33, were found guilty of conspiring to spy for Russia after a three-month trial at the Old Bailey.

Their handler, Orlin Roussev, 46, his lieutenant, Biser Dzhambazov, 43, and Ivan Stoyanov, 32, had already pleaded guilty to the charges under the Official Secrets Act.

Their well-financed activities spanned London, Vienna, Valencia, Montenegro and Stuttgart, with the two women intended to be used in a series of ‘honeytrap’ plots.

At least £200,000 was sent by the group’s Moscow-based handler, fugitive businessman Jan Marsalek, to finance the operations, which were planned over 80,000 messages exchanged with Roussev over Telegram.

And an ‘Aladdin’s Cave’ of sophisticated technology including rocks containing hidden cameras, a £120,000 device for intercepting mobile phone numbers, 11 drones, 221 mobile phones and 75 fake passports was found at Roussev’s guesthouse.

The Bulgarian referred to himself as ‘Q Branch’ after James Bond’s famous quartermaster, and built many of the devices himself – including a Coca-Cola bottle containing a hidden camera.

Commander Murphy said the investigation into the group was the largest he had seen in his two decades of counter-terrorism.

‘This was spying on an almost industrial scale on behalf of Russia,’ he added.

‘It felt like something you would expect to read in a spy novel. This is not something we see very often.‘

In the years since the 2018 Salisbury poisoning attack, Russian intelligence agencies have been forced to employ proxy groups rather than use their own highly-trained agents, Commander Murphy said.

‘I like to think that the way in which we responded to that attack, the way in which policing, the intelligence community and international partners came together in the way that we did, has made the UK a much more hostile environment for states to directly conduct activity here themselves,’ he added.

There are likely to be more Russian spy cells lurking across the UK, the senior officer warned.

‘My main message would be one of vigilance,’ he said.

‘So in the same way that we talk about counter terrorism, if something doesn’t feel right to you, call the anti-terrorism hotline. Get in touch with us.’

The Bulgarians will be sentenced in May.