Sudanese security capture key member of Israeli spy network: report

March 22, 2014 (KHARTOUM) – Sudan’s National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) has captured a key member of an Israeli spy network active in the country’s eastern Red Sea state, according to a newspaper report.

The Saturday issue of pro-government Al-Intibaha daily newspaper quoted a reliable source as saying that the security apparatus continued to carefully monitor Israel’s espionage activities for a long time, particularly among Sudanese citizens who fled to Israel since 2002 and returned through South Sudan and other neighbouring countries.

Al-Intibaha said that the unidentified spy provided information that helped Israel carry out several operations including the ones in April 2011 and May 2012 in the coastal city of Port Sudan which are believed to have targeted individuals involved in arms smuggling.

Israel neither admitted nor denied responsibility for any of these attacks of which the last one took place on October 2012 and destroyed Al-Yarmouk military factory in the southern suburbs of Khartoum

The same source affirmed that NISS closely monitored the spy network which continued to send Sudanese migrants to Israel through Sinai.

The Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) Chief of Staff, Benny Gantz, asserted this week that his country carries out secret operations in other countries.

“I did not even mention the dozens of secret activities, some of which took place last week, and [some] just as we speak,” he said. ”I am talking about close range operations and long-range ones – Iran, and so on. These are not areas that are beyond the IDF’s reach.”

Israel constantly accused Sudan of being a hub for Iranian weapons transported to Palestinian Islamist militants of Hamas in Gaza strip.

This month Israeli navy commandos seized a ship in the Red Sea off the Sudanese coast that was allegedly hiding Syrian-made M-302 surface-to-surface missiles supplied by. Iran and Hamas have denied the accusations.

Along with the missiles, some 180 mortar shells and 400,000 rifle rounds were laid out in neat piles on a pier in the port of Eilat to which the ship was hauled.

The NISS later released a statement saying that investigation it conducted has concluded that the vessel was unrelated to any Sudanese party.

However, it announced that the ship will not be permitted to enter the country.

(ST)