UK MP’s Russian ’spy’ assistant offered Kremlin TV role

LONDON - Katia Zatuliveter, an assistant to a UK MP and an alleged spy, has now been offered a job at the Kremlin’s English-language TV news propaganda channel.

Zatuliveter, a 25-year-old former parliamentary assistant for Mike Hancock, a Liberal Democrat MP, was arrested in December and ordered deported on MI5’s advice after it was decided that her continued presence in Britain was a potential threat to national security.

Since then, she has been released on bail and is living in London and will continue to do so until her appeal against her deportation can be heard in October.

However, her new role at RT, the Kremlin’s English-language TV news channel, could see her become a presenter in Moscow or even a London-based reporter.

“We are interested in working with Katia and she knows about it. I cannot say anything more now,” the Telegraph quoted Margarita Simonyan, RT’s editor-in-chief, as telling Russian media.

“We will only be able to give more detailed information once talks have been concluded with Ekaterina (Katia) herself.”

Zatuliveter, who last week had her bail conditions eased so that she could negotiate with RT, has insisted she is not a Russian spy though security service sources have said there is no doubt she was working for the Kremlin as a “sleeper agent,” either for its SVR foreign intelligence service or for its GRU military intelligence arm. (ANI)