[FPSPACE] Another Spy Trial: Igor Sutyagin - Is it a serious crisis already ?

[Woods, Dave]

Josh Handler had an article on his experiences in the March 2000 issue of
IEEE Spectrum:
Pg 51 "Under Suspicion".  Interesting reading.

I did not mean to imply that space researchers are safe.  Rather that if I
take pictures of 
Gagarin's 1961 capsule at the Energia Museum, I am probably safe.  If I
photograph some
military installation on the way out to Star City that can be seen from the
road, then I am 
treading on thin ice.  

I think in the case of Josh and others like Pavel Podvig (in the same issue)
who have 
experienced searches and seizures, each was digging into areas that were
militarily
and politically sensitive.  They may have been perceived as actually
gathering restricted
information or were just given a message that they had crossed the line.  In
either case,
these were chilling experiences for them personally and for others who might
be 
contemplating similar research ventures.  The doors that were open certainly
seem to
be closing.  

Dave

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Dwayne Allen Day [SMTP:wayneday@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu]
> Sent:	Wednesday, December 27, 2000 10:13 AM
> Cc:	'fpspace@friends-partners.org'
> Subject:	Re: [FPSPACE] Another Spy Trial: Igor Sutyagin - Is it a
> serious crisis already ?
> 
> If you read the Post article, you will see mention of Joshua Handler, a US
> researcher who used to work for Greenpeace.  Handler is a Princeton
> Ph.D. student who has written about Russian military environmental
> problems.  His Moscow apartment was searched, his laptop and notes were
> seized, and he was briefly detained.  He was then advised by friends to
> get out of the country before he got arrested.  He fled, without any of
> his research material.  The Russians now claim that he was a US
> intelligence agent.
> 
> Handler wrote about this incident early this year in the Bulletin of the
> Atomic Scientists.  I will see if I can find his article on-line.  He
> stated that he clearly felt threatened and he thought they were trying to
> make an example out of him:  poke around in sensitive subjects and you may
> be arrested.
> 
> I disagree with Dave on this and agree with Constantine that there is a
> real danger to space researchers, even those dealing with historical
> material.
> 
> I think it is only a matter of time before a space researcher gets
> arrested for this.
> 
> DDAY