Horrie's little spies come out to play!

Is this Horrie's little Marxist Daughter?

Portrayed as a flame-haired, green-eyed femme fatale, a 28-year-old Russian businesswoman has emerged as a tabloid darling in an alleged Cold War-style spy ring uncovered by US authorities.

Anna Chapman's Facebook photo was plastered on the front-page of the New York Daily News following her arrest along with 10 other alleged members of a sophisticated network of US-based Russian sleeper agents.

Dubbed the "Red Head" by the New York Post, Chapman is alleged to have passed on information to a Russian official during scenes that could have come straight out of a John Le Carre novel.


This image taken from the Russian social networking website "Odnoklassniki", or Classmates, shows a woman identified as Anna Chapman. Photo: AP

The spy ring also includes a Peruvian journalist who has worked in New York for 20 years and is notorious for a kidnap scandal in Peru.

Vicky Pelaez, 55, was among 11 suspects who were allegedly dispatched by the Russian intelligence service for a long term operation to search and develop ties in US policy-making circles.

The criminal complaint filed by US Justice Department describes how on 10 Wednesdays between January and June 2010 she "covertly exchanged electronic communications via a private wireless network" with her Russian handler.



To avoid having to meet, Chapman and this unidentified man, who the FBI repeatedly observed entering Russia's UN mission in Manhattan, used specially configured laptops to exchange messages.

The complaint describes how on one occasion Chapman sat herself by the window of a Manhattan coffee shop. Her handler passed by 10 minutes later in a minivan, close enough to pick up her communications on their covert network.

Last week an FBI agent, purporting to be a Russian consulate employee, arranged an undercover face-to-face meeting with Chapman in another coffee shop in downtown Manhattan, saying he had something urgent to give her.


Waldomar Mariscal, son of Vicky Pelaez and Juan Lazaro who were arrested on charges of spying for the Russians. Photo: AP

During their meeting, detailed exhaustively in the criminal complaint, Chapman is asked to give a fake passport to another Russian agent, presumably another undercover FBI operative.

Asked if she is ready to carry out this "next step", Chapman replies: "Shit, of course," according to the charge sheet.

Chapman appeared in federal court for the first time on Monday in Manhattan, where Judge James Cott ordered her detention.




Dressed in jeans and a white T-shirt, she spoke for several minutes with a lawyer after being released from her handcuffs.

According to the New York Post and the Russian news website lifenews.ru, Chapman moved to New York in February from Moscow after a divorce.

In an interview posted on video-sharing site YouTube, Chapman described herself as a start-up specialist, seeking to build a recruitment agency targeting young professionals in Moscow and New York.



In the YouTube video, part of a series titled "Online School for Start-Up" Chapman says she worked for several years in London in an investment company. In Moscow she set up a property search website.

In New York, she had launched a business "Time Venture", specialising in "technology, Internet, media and leisure activities," she adds, claiming to develop global strategies for new businesses.

On Chapman's Facebook page, meanwhile, the budding business tycoon sets out a bold personal philosophy. "If you can imagine it, you can achieve it. If you can dream it, you can become it," she comments.

During Monday's court hearing, Chapman's business was valued at $US2 million dollars.

Her lawyer Robert Baum argued vigorously against Chapman's incarceration, claiming she was an innocent, who had wrongly caught in the FBI dragnet.

"The complaint alleges the conspiracy has been going on since 1990. But my client did not place foot in the United States until 2005," Baum said, adding that Chapman's visa had been revoked last Saturday.

Judge Cott rejected her court-appointed attorney's pleas however. "The defendant was not just the innocent by-stander. The defendant will be detained," he said.

Peruvian Russian spy?

Pelaez's family and friends released details of the FBI raid late Sunday in the northern New York suburb of Yonkers.

Pelaez was detained along with her husband as they returned from a party.

"They took them out of the car and led them to two vehicles," her son Waldo Mariscal told La Prensa Spanish-language newspaper, his mother's employer.

He said FBI agents removed computers from the house and interrogated him about his parents' politics and finances.

"There were about 30 people searching the house," said Juan, another son.

The newspaper's editor, Manuel Avendano, said that Pelaez was very controversial and had attracted both supporters and detractors.

She is best known for her opinion columns, which often criticise the US government.

Pelaez left Peru after making her name at the Frecuencia Latina TV channel where she was renowned for her aggressive style.

In 1985 she made headlines for being kidnapped by and interviewing the communist Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA).

In a murky affair, Frecuencia Latina later sacked her for allegedly fabricating the kidnapping.

Pelaez emigrated to the United States soon afterwards.

She appeared before a New York judge on Monday and was due to remain in detention until at least July 27.

The US Justice Department said on Monday that 10 "deep-cover" suspects, accused of infiltrating US policymaking for the Kremlin, had been detained on suspicion of seeking details of US nuclear weapons and foreign policy.

Police in Cyprus arrested an 11th suspect trying to board an early Tuesday flight to Budapest.

AFP

Is this Horrie's little Marxist Daughter?

Barneyline is very funny....the russki admin hass views more in sympathy with your own than any other ideology...even down to support for brown bag regimes

R00ting for secrets. It's as old as espionage itself. When will these dumb fark "high-ranking" policy officials wake up? "Oooooh, damn that was good - now can I tell you about our latest ICBM technology?"

Rooting for secrets? If only RD knew the secret for rooting . . .

Harsh but fair.

And what about all those chicks (and dudes ) that got interviewed in the States who were "r00ting for the US Sarker team" during WC2010?