Spanish journalist or Russian spy? The thriller round Pablo González’s double life | EUROtoday

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When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, reporters from all over the world rushed to the Polish-Ukrainian border to cowl an exodus of refugees fleeing Russian bombs.

Among them was Pablo González, a contract journalist from Spain who had been primarily based in Poland since 2019, working for Spanish information company EFE, Voice of America and different shops. Warsaw-based reporters knew him as an outgoing colleague who favored to drink beer and sing karaoke into the wee hours of the morning.

Two and a half years later, he was despatched to Moscow as a part of a prisoner swap, abandoning each mysteries about who he actually was and considerations about how Poland dealt with a case through which he was accused of being a Russian agent.

In the primary days of the struggle, González supplied stand-up studies to TV viewers in Spain towards a backdrop of refugees arriving on the prepare station within the Polish border city of Przemysl.

But lower than week into the struggle, Polish safety brokers entered the room he was staying in and arrested him. They accused him of “participating in foreign intelligence activities against Poland” and stated he was an agent of the GRU, Russian navy intelligence.

Friends had been astonished — and, as Poland held González with out trial for months that become years, some grew skeptical and arranged protests in Spain demanding his launch. Authorities have by no means detailed the accusations.

But on Thursday night, the burly 42-year-old with a shaved head and beard was welcomed residence by President Vladimir Putin after being freed within the largest prisoner swap because the Soviet period.

His inclusion within the deal seems to verify suspicions that González was a Russian operative utilizing his cowl as a journalist.

Born Pavel Rubtsov in 1982 in then-Soviet Moscow, González went to Spain along with his Spanish mom at age 9, the place he turned a citizen and acquired the Spanish title of Pablo González Yagüe. He went into journalism, working for shops Público, La Sexta and Gara, a Basque nationalist newspaper.

It’s not clear what led Poland to arrest him. The investigation stays labeled and the spokesman for the key providers instructed The Associated Press that he couldn’t say something past what was in a short assertion. Poland is on excessive alert after a string of arrests of espionage suspects and sabotage, a part of what the authorities view as hybrid warfare by Russia and Belarus towards the West.

Polish safety providers stated Poland included him within the deal as a result of shut Polish-American alliance and “common security interests.” In their assertion, they stated that “Pavel Rubtsov, a GRU officer arrested in Poland in 2022, (had been) carrying out intelligence tasks in Europe.”

The head of Britain’s foreign intelligence agency MI6, Sir Richard Moore, said at the Aspen Security Forum in 2022 that González was an “illegal” who was arrested in Poland after “masquerading as a Spanish journalist.”

“He was trying to go into Ukraine to be part of their destabilizing efforts there,” Moore said.

Another hint at his activities came from independent Russian outlet Agentstvo, which reported that in 2016 Rubtsov befriended and spied on Zhanna Nemtsova, the daughter of Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, who was murdered in Moscow in 2015.

Poland-based journalists who knew González said he used his base in Poland to travel to former Soviet countries including Ukraine and Georgia. He had a license to operate a drone and used it to film Auschwitz-Birkenau from the air for coverage on the 75th anniversary of the death camp’s liberation in 2020.

Voice of America, a U.S.-government funded organization, confirmed that he worked briefly for them, but they have since removed any of his work from their website.

“Pablo González contributed to a few VOA stories as a freelancer over a relatively short period of time starting in late 2020,” spokesperson Emily Webb stated in reply to an emailed question. “As a freelancer who provided content to a number of media outlets, his services were arranged through a third-party company used by news organizations around the world.”

“At no time did he have any entry to any VOA programs or VOA credentials,” Webb stated. “As soon as VOA learned of the allegations, we removed his material.”

Because Poland’s justice system was politicized under a populist government that ruled in 2015-23, some activists worried about whether his rights were respected. Reporters Without Borders was among the groups that called for him to be put on trial or released.

The group stands by its position that he should not have been held that long without trial. “You are innocent until a trial proves you guilty,” Alfonso Bauluz, the head of the group’s office in Spain told AP on Friday. He expressed frustration at the silence around the case, and the fact that there will apparently not be a trial at all, saying Poland has not presented the evidence it has against him.

But the group also says it expects González to provide an explanation now that he is free.

Jaap Arriens, a Dutch video journalist based in Warsaw, hung out with the man he knew as Pablo in Warsaw and Kyiv, as well as in Przemysl shortly before his arrest.

Arriens described him as a friendly, funny man with a macho demeanor and a chest covered in tattoos that he once showed off in a bar.

González mostly fit in, but seemed better-off than the average freelance journalist. He always seemed to have the newest and most expensive phones and computers, working at the Poland-Ukraine border with the latest 14-inch MacBook Pro. He had plenty of money to spend in bars.

He recalled González once saying: “Life is good, life is almost too good.”

“And I assumed: ‘Man, freelance life is never too good. What are you talking about?’ I do not know any freelancer who talks like this.”

González, whose grandfather emigrated from Spain to the Soviet Union as a toddler in the course of the Spanish Civil War, was referred to as a Basque nationalist with ties to the area’s independence motion.

Russia is suspected of supporting separatist actions in Spain and elsewhere in an effort to destabilize Europe.

González’ spouse in Spain had been advocating on his behalf throughout his detention in Poland, though they weren’t dwelling collectively on the time of his arrest.

Over the previous years, the suspect’s supporters ran an account on Twitter, now X, to advocate for his launch.

When he was despatched to Moscow on Thursday, the @FreePabloGonzález account tweeted: “This is our last tweet: Pablo is finally free. Endless thanks to all.”

Those who’ve adopted the case at the moment are awaiting González’s subsequent strikes.

He has Spanish citizenship — and the best to return to the European Union. His spouse was quoted in Spanish media saying she hopes he can return to Spain.