VLADIVOSTOK. Feb 8 (Interfax-AVN) - Russian military counterintelligence took interest in the activity of military journalist Grigory Pasko, later charged with spying, after he had been in touch with the representation office of the Japanese NHK television company in the Maritime territory.
According to the TV program Chelovek i Zakon (Man and Law) broadcast on ORT on Thursday, head of the NHK office in the Maritime territory Takao Jun arrived in Vladivostok in December 1996 and soon drew the counterintelligence service's attention by his keen interest in the Russian nuclear submarine fleet, secret military facilities, and defense enterprises located in the region.
Russian special services further learned that there was one Grigory who regularly visited the NHK bureau, having previously arranged the meetings, an officer from the Federal Security Service (FSB) department for the Maritime territory told the TV program. This man turned out to be the journalist Pasko from the Boyevaya Vakhta newspaper. His visits to the NHK office "strangely coincided" with days when he received various documents from the Pacific Fleet headquarters, the FSB officer said. These visits were unknown to either the Pacific Fleet headquarters or the Boyevaya Vakhta editorial office, the TV program claims.
Pasko did not care about the fact that the documents he was handing over to the NHK office contained classified information, head of the investigative department of the FSB office for the Pacific Fleet Alexander Yegorkin said. "I think his interest was purely mercenary. He collected everything he could," Yegorkin said.
On December 25, 2001, the Pacific Fleet Military Court found Pasko guilty of high treason in the form of espionage and sentenced him to 4 years in a maximum security penitentiary.