Putin orders intelligence to stay vigilant to foil foreign spy agencies

Russian President Vladimir Putin called on the country's intelligence services to be vigilant and "put a firm stop" to activities of foreign espionage agencies.

"The counterintelligence agencies, including the military ones, need to show utmost readiness and concentration. It is necessary to put a firm stop to the activities of foreign special services, and to promptly identify traitors, spies, and diversionists," Putin said in a video address marking the country's Security Agency Worker's Day.

Praising law enforcement officers as "people, who spare no effort," including sometimes their lives, to safeguard their country and people, Putin underlined that the "rapidly changing" global conditions and new threats and challenges "impose high demands on the entire system of Russia’s security agencies."

So, he added, security agencies must step up their efforts in key areas, using their potential "to the fullest."

About parts of Ukraine that Russia annexed earlier this year, Putin said security staff now faced "difficult tasks" as conditions are "extremely complicated" in Donetsk and Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia.

Putin asserted that the fight against terrorism was "one of the key priorities for all security services," urging security staff to take special care of protecting crowded places, strategic facilities, and transport and energy infrastructure.

He stressed that the Federal Security Service (FSB) Border Guard Service must also step up its efforts and swiftly prevent any attempts to infiltrate Russia's borders "using the existing capacities and tools, including mobile and special task units."

"You must stay focused on such an important area as countering extremism. Belligerent nationalism calling for violence and provocations aimed at stirring up ethnic hatred is a direct threat to our society's internal unity. Special services must respond to such attempts promptly," he said.

The Security Agency Worker's Day is celebrated in Russia on Dec. 20, marking the founding of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission, the predecessor of modern security agencies, in 1917.