Fifty-first edition of the N&O column / Spooks newsletter

(Date: Fri, 02 Aug 2002 23:10:27 +0200)

Intelligence news

Russia

Both Pravda and Space News reported that Russia has launched a pair of classified military satellites into Earth orbit aboard a Kosmos-3M. The rocket was launched on 8 July from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome launching site. The secret cargo consisting of two spacecraft -- dubbed Kosmos 2390 and Kosmos 2391 -- were placed into an orbit of approximately 1465 by 1505 km, inclined 82.5 degrees, according to Western space watchers. Experts aren't exactly sure what the satellites will be used for since their orbit is different than past military craft launched by Kosmos-3M rockets.

[Sources: Pravda, Space News]

The Araks/Arkon (11F664) satellite, Kosmos-2392, was launched from Baykonur on Jul 25. The satellite is a large (2600 kg) imaging satellite built by Lavochkin, and derived from the Mars/Venera probe bus. The Arkon satellites are operated by the Russian Ministry of Defense and reportedly used for both military and civilian imaging; the first one in the series was Kosmos-2344 in Jun 1997. The Kosmos-2344 launch reportedly used an 17S40 (DM5) upper stage, a minor modification of the 11S861-01 Blok DM-2M stage. As of early Jul 26, no orbital data for Kosmos-2392 had been issued by Space Command.

[Source: Jonathan's Space Report

France

The head of the DGSE, Jean-Claude Cousseran has been dismissed and was replaced by Pierre Brochand, who was the French ambassador to Portugal.

Spain

The new Spanish intelligence acts seem to be in force. Which means that the Spanish intelligence agency CESID has a new name: Centro Nacional de Inteligencia (CNI). Beside the name change, also the position of CNI's director has changed. He is now "Secretario de Estado" which is the equivalent to Staatssecretaris (Holland/Belgium), Minister of State (UK), or Assistant Secretary of State (USA). He his tasked with the responsibilities as National Authority for Intelligence and Counter-intelligence and director of the National Cryptologic Centre as well.

Australia

According to "The Australian", the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO), has placed active members and sympathizers of al-Qaida, under surveillance. Including some Australian citizens who trained in Afghanistan with the terrorist group.

The Australian says that "ASIO has identified three classes of al-Qaida activists in Australia. These are Australian citizens, mostly of Middle East origin, who trained with al-Qaida in Afghanistan. There are also a small number of Muslim organizations with intimate links to al-Qaida. And there are individuals with long-standing links to al-Qaida's South-East Asian networks. These people have connections with the Jemaah Islamiah radical Muslim group based in Indonesia. Members of Jemaah Islamiah were involved in a plot to attack the US embassy and the British and Australian high commissions in Singapore."

Canberra sources indicate that all the main South-East Asian nations, especially Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and The Philippines, are actively co-operating with Australia and the US in counter-terrorism.