Ex-CIA employee: Austria does not want to reveal uncomfortable truths
“A reckoning with the Russian influence in Austria”, is the name of the article from Tuesday, which shows Austria in a bad light. The focus is on ex-BVT man Egisto Ott. According to the Washington Post, which cites “security officials and investigative filings,” he IS suspected of selling state secrets and information on certain Kremlin secrets to Russia. It is the presumption of innocence. The US media is said to have “hundreds of pages of documents” available, and the journalists said they spoke to more than a dozen “Western officials” and informants who were familiar with the case.
“No Inconvenient Truths”
“These are things that the Austrian government needs to get to the bottom of, but personally I don’t know if the Austrians will go that far,” Sonya Seunghye Lin, a former senior CIA agent in Europe, was quoted as saying. “I think their attitude since the ’40s and ’50s has been that they’d rather not expose uncomfortable truths.”
What Austria’s state security Ott accuses
Egisto Ott has already had several processes and negotiations, and recently he has also been a topic in the U-Committee. In 2017, Egisto Ott – at that time leader of undercover investigators in the BVT (now Directorate of State Security and Intelligence) – like the “courier” wrote at the beginning of the year, reported by his boss Peter Gridling on suspicion of betrayal of state secrets, two days later there was a raid on Ott’s home – it was not the last. According to the BVT report, Ott “must have classified documents and other information passed it on to a foreign intelligence service – allegedly to the Russian secret service”. He is accused of having been recruited by Russia from abroad, Ott is said to deny this.
Ott is also said to have sent confidential and secret emails from his private account, a US secret service got wind of it. According to “Kurier”, Ott is said to have stated that he did not know that the data was confidential.
The Washington Post’s new allegations
According to the Washington Post, European security officials suspect that Ott was planning to restructure the Austrian secret service with other secret service employees. “I’ve never heard of Mr. Ott,” Karin Kneissl – Foreign Minister at the time – is said to have told the medium via WhatsApp. They also know nothing of any corresponding plans.
Ott sees conspiracy against him
According to the Washington Post, Ott himself suspects a conspiracy against him because he condemned waste in his department and denounced illegal requests from secret services. “They watch too much TV,” he is said to have added to the allegations that he had transmitted secret data.
USA: If Ott comes to the conference, we won’t come
According to unspecified security officials, Ott had been under suspicion for years before his brief arrest. According to “Post”, he was stopped at Vienna Airport in November 2017 because the CIA warned months in advance that Ott wanted to sell information to Russians. The US is said to have even threatened not to take part in a security conference in Amsterdam if Ott appeared. This led to the raid on Ott, in which, according to the Austrian authorities, nothing incriminating was discovered.
Ott was suspended from duty and transferred to the Center for International Affairs at the Interior Ministry in 2018, also briefly arrested in 2021. He was also incriminated by another superior. Ott is said to have requested information from databases for Wirecard boss Jan Marsalek.
Hundreds of illegal search queries despite a transfer?
After his transfer, Ott is said to have collected further national and international information, pretending to do so in an official capacity. The “Post” writes of “hundreds of illegal searches in secured databases” about people all over Europe.
Information relevant to Russia?
The Austrian wanted to know from the secret service whether a woman previously suspected of being a Russian spy was still under surveillance. He also found out about the investigative medium’s Russia specialist Bellingcat, Hristo Grosew, informed. The journalist responded to the “Post” request that he had been informed about the investigation and believed that it was carried out at the request of the Russians.
Tips for the Secret Service
A document is said to have been found on Ott’s phone that shows the weaknesses of a Russian operation in Berlin and makes suggestions for improvement. Western officials would assume, according to US media, that the author was Ott himself.
Doubts about Austria’s will to investigate
The Ott case is far from over, and if you ask the Washington Post, it’s not likely to happen. “Active and former security officials outside of Austria are skeptical that the parliamentary and other investigations go into depth enough,” the US media gives the Austrian authorities a bad report.