Russian Sleeper Agents Sentenced in Slovenia

A Russian couple in Slovenia, posing as Argentine citizens, were arrested on espionage charges in December 2022. They were sentenced to 19 months in prison and banned from Slovenia for five years. The couple used fake identities to run businesses and reportedly worked for Russian intelligence.

A Russian couple, arrested on spying charges in December 2022, pleaded guilty and received 19-month prison sentences in Slovenia's capital. They were released on time served.

The Ljubljana court also banned the sleeper agents from re-entering Slovenia for five years.

Sentenced for espionage and using fake documents to register businesses, the couple posed as Argentine citizens after settling in Slovenia in 2017. The husband, under the alias Ludwig Gisch, operated a startup IT company, while the wife, with false documents under the name Maria Rosa Mayer Muños, managed an online art gallery. Their real names are Artem Viktorovich Dultsev and Anna Valerevna Dultseva, media reports revealed.

They allegedly used Ljubljana as a hub to travel to NATO and EU member countries, transmitting orders from Moscow and transporting money to other Russian sleeper agents. Their trial was not public, and they have two children who attended an international school in Ljubljana.

(With inputs from agencies.)