'Dublin's like Berlin in the Cold War' says spy
Sunday July 08 2007
JEROME REILLY
IRELAND has become a centre for commercial espionage with Dublin "like Berlin in the Cold War", according to a former top CIA operative.
The claims were made by Robert Baer who began his career as a spy when he became case officer with the CIA Directorate of Operations.
During a 20-year career as a covert operative, he had field assignments in India, Beirut, Tajikstan and northern Iraq .
"Let's say I wanted to know about you. The first thing I want is cell-phone records. Let's say I've got your landline number. From your landline I can do a data search and I can get your cell phone number in Ireland very easily," he said.
Mr Baer claimed that if he wanted to find a list of calls made from any mobile phone in the last six months, he could buy that information from a Dublin-based firm.
"Every time you make a phone call, it is registered. Dublin is kind of like Berlin during the Cold War because you've got Russians coming through. The police, they turn a blind eye," he told radio presenter Myles Dungan.
"Remember, in Iran Contra they had Irish passports. And I think our section chief in Teheran had an Irish passport.
"The Irish were very co-operative. They were on our side during the Cold War. There was a particular Russian - the Irish didn't care about the Russians one way or another - but they would give them to us."
He said the CIA never had any problems operating in Ireland "as long as they didn't break the law". He said the commercial espionage was post-CIA stuff which he knew about because of ex-colleagues. He told the RTE presenter that with his landline number, he could access all his telephone records within 30 minutes using a resource in Ireland. "It costs a lot of money," he added.
