Former guard at US embassy in Norway convicted of spying for Russia and Iran

A former security guard at the US Embassy in Norway was convicted of espionage on Wednesday after a court in Oslo found that he spied for Russia and Iran.

The 28-year-old Norwegian man, whose name has not been made public, was sentenced to three years and seven months behind bars.

He had acknowledged the indictment’s facts but denied any criminal guilt.

Prosecutors said he handed over details about the embassy’s diplomats, its floor plans and security routines, among other things, Norwegian state broadcaster NRK reported.

The broadcaster reported that American ties to Israel and the war in Gaza prompted the man to contact Russia and Iran.

In a statement on Thursday, the man's defence attorneys said the verdict raises questions about what is considered espionage under Norwegian law.

"He lied about having security clearance to agents from other countries and exaggerated his own role," attorney Inger Zadig of Elden Law Firm said in the statement.

"He had roughly the same level of access as a janitor at the embassy. The information he shared was worthless and neither separately nor collectively capable of harming individuals or the security interests of any state."

The defendant was found guilty of five espionage-related charges and acquitted of gross corruption.

His defence attorneys are weighing whether to appeal the verdict, while prosecutor Carl Fredrik Fari said his team is considering appealing the sentence because the state had asked for more than six years in prison.

At the time of his arrest last November, the man had been studying for a bachelor's degree in security and preparedness at Norway’s Arctic University, UiT.

It is a second such case at UiT in recent years, according to NRK.

One of the people the West swapped with Russia in a major prisoner exchange last year was a UiT guest researcher who claimed to be a Brazilian named José Assis Giammaria, arrested on espionage allegations in 2022.

The police revealed him to be a Russian national by the name of Mikhail Valeryevich Mikushin.

Norway has a 198-kilometre border with Russia in the Arctic and since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the country has heavily restricted entry for Russian nationals.

Last year, the Norwegian government said it was considering a plan to build a fence along all or part of its border with Russia.