Two Russian-Australian citizens arrested on vague charges of “preparing for espionage”

The heads of the Australian Federal Police (AFP) and the Australian intelligence service ASIO announced the arrest of two men with Australian-Russian citizenship in a dramatic press conference last Friday. They are accused of “preparing an espionage offence”.

According to reports, the case is flimsy and politically constructed. The aim is apparently to stir up a war mood against Russia. The arrests apparently coincided with the NATO summit in Washington, which took place last week and further escalated the US and NATO war against Russia in Ukraine.

To add drama to the matter, AFP provided the media with videos showing Russian-born couple Kira Korolev, 40, and Igor Korolev, 62, being arrested in their apartment in the Brisbane suburb of Everton Park last Thursday. The mainstream media dutifully labelled the couple as “suspected spies” involved in a “sleeper agent plot”.

Many questions remain unanswered. First of all, the Korolevs have hardly been hiding. Kira was active on social media and published a Russian-language travelogue about her numerous trips around Australia and back to Russia. Both had used Facebook for more than a decade to share details of their lives in Australia.

According to the allegations, Kira, a low-ranking army “information systems technician,” traveled to Russia, where she asked her husband, who was allegedly self-employed, to access undisclosed “specific information” from her official army account and send it to her private email address.

As a soldier, Kira Korolev was required to report all trips abroad. AFP Commissioner Reece Kershaw said police would claim some of the information was “misleading”.

However, since Korolev had reported to the army that she was out of the country, her email activity would have been a trigger. If they were spies, the Korolevs’ activities were obvious, amateurish, and bound to be discovered.

A coroner in Brisbane ordered the couple to appear in court again on September 20. The indictment alleges that Kira Korolev unlawfully accessed, copied and distributed information from Department of Defence computer systems relating to “national security” and that she maintained relationships with members or operatives of Russian intelligence for the purpose of disseminating that information.

The maximum penalty for the charge is 15 years in prison, but if a direct connection to a foreign company is alleged, the penalty can be increased to life imprisonment.

Commissioner Kershaw said: “We allege that they (the Korolevs) sought this information with the intention of disclosing it to the Russian authorities.” But neither he nor ASIO Director Mike Burgess would say whether any sensitive information had been handed over or whether the couple had had any contact with the Russian authorities at all.

They said investigators had not identified any other people involved and stressed that “national security” had not been compromised. Burgess said that when the alleged spying preparations were discovered, “we were able to get it under control.”

Among the questions raised is the delayed timing of the arrests. ASIO agents had gained access to the Kirolovs’ unit through a caretaker at least three months earlier, and the alleged espionage preparations dated back at least 18 months. The offences are alleged to have taken place between December 6, 2022 and July 11, 2024 in Brisbane and the Russian Federation.

The arrests came as the Labor government increased its commitment to the war against Russia. At the NATO summit, Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles announced the country’s largest military aid package for Ukraine.