TEMPO.CO, London - Britain and the Netherlands accused Russia of running a global campaign of cyber attacks to undermine Western democracies, including what the Dutch government described as an attempt to hack into the U.N. chemical weapons watchdog.
Moscow denied what its Foreign Ministry spokeswoman called a "diabolical perfume cocktail" of allegations by someone with a "rich imagination". But the accusations will deepen Moscow's isolation at a time when its diplomatic ties with the West have been downgraded over the poisoning of a spy in England and it is under U.S. and European sanctions over its actions in Ukraine.
Dutch authorities said they had disrupted an attempt to hack into the Hague-based Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in April. At the time, the U.N. watchdog was investigating the poison used to attack an ex-spy in Britain and chemical weapons which the West says were used in Syria by Russia's ally President Bashar al-Assad.
Dutch Defence Minister Ank Bijleveld called on Russia to cease its cyber activities aimed at "undermining" Western democracies.
According to a presentation by the head of the Netherlands' military intelligence agency, four Russians arrived in the Netherlands on April 10 and were caught with spying equipment at a hotel located next to the OPCW headquarters.
The four Russians in the Netherlands were detained on April 13 and expelled to Russia, Dutch Major General Onno Eichelsheim said. They had planned to travel on to a laboratory in Spiez, Switzerland used by the OPCW to analyse samples, he said.
Russian military intelligence "is active here in the Netherlands ... where a lot of international organisations are (based)," Eichelsheim said.
REUTERS
