TALLINN - Hearings began in a Moscow court last week over Lt. Col. Igor Vyalkov, a senior Federal Security Service officer accused of spying for Estonia.
The prosecutor's office has accused Vyalkov of treason and repeated illegal border crossing.
During the first hearing the defendant declared that he wanted to discard his two lawyers, because they didn't agree with his defense tactic. The court satisfied the request, postponing the trial until the officer finds a new defense lawyer.
According to the scanty information available in the Russian press, Lt. Col. Vyalkov served in the border guard, which was later taken over by the FSS, until 2002. The indictment said that Vyalkov committed treason in 2001 when he began collecting and distributing classified information on Russian security, which he accessed through his post.
Russian authorities kept the spy scandal secret from the public until this May, when the Interfax news agency released information that a service employee, who had been working as a foreign spy, would be brought to justice, the daily Postimees reported.
The paper also received an unofficial confirmation that Vyalkov had indeed collaborated with the Estonian special service alone.
Since Vyalkov worked as a border guard officer at Moscow's Sheremetyevo-2 Airport, he could easily enter the airport's transit zone, according to the Izvestiya daily.
The paper, however, was unable to establish how Vyalkov passed on the classified materials and to whom.
The Gazeta.ru Internet portal reported that the service exposed Vyalkov only on Sep. 23, 2002. He was finally arrested with evidence after once again secretly crossing the border and attempting to hand over materials to foreign intelligence officers.
"Our attempts to receive some kind of more specific information about the case were unsuccessful," Izvestiya wrote. "Neither the Military Prosecutor's Office, nor the court, nor the FSS agreed to comment, citing the extremely delicate nature of the case."
If convicted of treason alone, Vyalkov could get 12 to 20 years in prison as well as receiving a fine of up to 500,000 rubles (13,700 euros), the Russian press reported.
