KRASNODAR (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 02nd July, 2021) A reserve lieutenant was sentenced in to eight years in prison on charges of espionage in the Krasnodar region, the regional court said on Friday.
Andrey Pikula spied for a foreign state, collecting information constituting a state secret and leaking it to a representative of foreign special services.
The court found that the man was "recruited" in the fall of 2018. In exchange for his services he was offered "general patronage on the territory of a foreign state."
"In the fall of 2019, Pikula collected the information and handed it over to an employee of a foreign intelligence department. His activities were suppressed by officers of the Russian Federal Security Service in the Krasnodar region. At the hearing, the defendant fully admitted his guilt," the court press release said.
The man was sentenced to eight years in a strict-regime penal colony and was deprived of his military rank.
The verdict has not yet entered into legal force and can be appealed.
