Who is Alexander Kashitsyn? Alleged Russian spy tried to recruit Conservative Party chairman Greg Hands

Greg Hands, the new Conservative Party Chairman, claims that he was the target of a recruitment attempt by a suspected Russian spy many years ago. According to the cabinet minister, he met Alexander Kashitsyn, who he now thinks was a secret agent, at the seven stars pub in Fulham, while he has been seeking election as Tory MP for the area almost 20 years ago.

Also Read | BORG drinking: All about the Viral TikTok drinking hack trend

Who is Alexander Kashitsyn?

Hands was elected as MP for Chelsea and Fulham in 2010. He claimed that Kashitsyn had first introduced himself as a Russian Embassy worker during a conservative event in 2004 at which Boris Johnson was a guest speaker.

Kashitsyn asked for a meeting at the pub and probed Hands for secret information about Iran’s nuclear program.

Also Read | What is Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis? Symptoms, causes and prevention

During an interaction with Channel 4 for a Dispatches documentary, Hands said first he’s said he wanted to talk about street-sweeping cleaning or bin collection.

Then he asked Hands to get him a document related to the Iranian nuclear program from the House of Commons Library. Hands said he declined to help as he was very suspicious.

Also Read | Why New Mexico State suspended men’s basketball program ‘until further notice’

“I was very suspicious. I thought he was a Russian intelligence officer getting a soon-to-be British Member of Parliament to do something for the Russian state. This is sometimes a sort of classic kind of… a sort of espionage technique”, Hands said.

According to Hands, this is sometimes of a sort of a classic kind of espionage technique.

Also Read | Missiles thrown, police vehicles damaged in protests at Knowsley Suites Hotel, Liverpool: Watch

He also disclosed that two years later MI5 officers said that his number was found on the phone of a Russian intelligence operative.

Greg Hands’ claim is one of several new expose that looks at suggestions that Tory activists went to a strip club in Moscow under a Russian intelligence operation that allegedly sought to collect material on yet-to-be political leaders.