The Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) has detained a Belarusian spy in Kyiv who worked for the KGB and attempted to infiltrate the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine (GUR MO) to gather intelligence and recruit agents. She was identified as Belarusian journalist Inna Kardash, who had been working in Ukraine as a journalist under cover since 2020, and her candidacy as an agent was approved by the highest leadership of Belarus. This was reported by UNN with reference to the SSU.
Details
As reported by UNN with reference to the Office of the Prosecutor General and the GUR, a deeply undercover spy who had been working for the KGB of Belarus since 2015 and was attempting to infiltrate one of the units of Ukrainian military intelligence was detained in Kyiv.
"As part of a joint, long-term, and comprehensive special operation by the internal security of the GUR MO of Ukraine and SSU investigators, under the procedural guidance of the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine, a spy from the Belarusian KGB who attempted to infiltrate one of the units of Ukrainian military intelligence was exposed. The 35-year-old enemy agent was detained in Kyiv and charged with espionage," the GUR reported.
As part of the special operation, which lasted several months, SSU officers and GUR internal security documented the criminal activities of the Belarusian spy and played an operational game with her – feeding her disinformation under the guise of secret data.
The spy is currently in custody. She faces 15 years in prison with confiscation of property, the intelligence service summarized.
According to sources in Ukrainian special services, the person in question is Belarusian journalist Inna Kardash.
The Security Service of Ukraine published a video of Kardash's conversation with her handler, where she admits to working as a journalist under cover: "It's just that the role of an intelligence officer under the guise of a journalist suits me better. That's the truth. I'm very good at obtaining information."
"Imagine you are on a long-term assignment, then every month, depending on the circumstances, I offer you 3,000 euros to start," her handler told her.
According to him, the agent's espionage was approved by the highest leadership of Belarus.
As stated by the SSU, already during the full-scale invasion, the agent's handler instructed her to travel to one of the EU countries for additional briefing. The woman crossed the border under a fabricated pretext of a medical examination.
To contact the Belarusian special services officer in the European Union, the suspect purchased a new smartphone with a "disposable" SIM card and then disposed of the gadget.
In the recordings, the handler says: "Reset to factory settings and just accidentally break it."
After returning to Kyiv, the agent tried to get a job in one of the staff units of our state's Military Intelligence, where she came under the development of the GUR's Internal Security.
"I'm just great because my fingers don't sweat in principle, my fingerprints are hard to take, meaning my fingers are hard to calculate. My heartbeat is weak, and I've already taught myself. I understood sooner or later that I would have a polygraph, and I'm ready for it," the agent admits, having received instructions on how to successfully pass a polygraph.
Addition
From 2012 to 2015, Kardash worked for "United Company" and "Maxbet," and from 2018 to 2019, she collaborated with "Tutbaymedia."
After that, Kardash collaborated with many foreign media as a freelance journalist. In 2020, Kardash officially started working for the "Ukraine" TV channel in Belarus. She was detained several times while covering protests. Presumably, Kardash left Belarus in late 2020.
In Ukraine, Kardash worked for the currently sanctioned TV channel "112," and then got a job at the Interfax news agency.