Former KGB spy given Lithuanian residence permit

  • 2015-10-02
  • BNS/TBT Staff/VILNIUS

According to Lithuanian weekly, Veidas, Yuri Sagaidak who was deported from Great Britain back in 1989 as a KGB spy has received a Lithuanian residence permit.

According to Veidas' sources, Sagaidak was issued a temporary residence permit to live in Lithuania, irrespective of his service with the KGB. 

The permit was extended once, with a further extension refused in 2013.

After working for five years in Indonesia, Sagaidak was later an alleged journalist in Great Britain who was sent expelled from the country shortly before the end of Cold War. 

Sagaidak is mentioned in the events surrounding the lawyer Sergey Magnitsky who was murdered in prison. He is also the man behind a propaganda movie filmed for Russia's Federal Security Service.

According to the weekly, Sagaidak registered a company, Consulit in Lithuania in 2011, which has staff of five people. 

The company's registered address was in one of the apartments owned by Kaziiera Nijole Butkeviciene, the mother of Lithuania's first post-independence defence minister who was later convicted for attempted fraud.

Arturas Paulauskas, chairman of the Lithuanian parliamentary National Security and Defense Committee, said he would not be surprised to find out that Sagaidak was issued the residence permit without any background checks.