According to German media, prosecutors think Carsten L gave knowledge regarding the Ukrainian conflict with the Wagner mercenary group and got approximately €400,000 (£340,000).

Another German guy suspected of acting as a courier has also been charged.

Both guys risk life in prison.

In accordance with German privacy laws, the employee at Germany’s foreign intelligence service (BND), known only as Carsten L, managed a department that monitored abroad telephone and internet communications.

According to Süddeutsche Zeitung and public broadcasters NDR and WDR, he was promoted to a position responsible for background checks at the agency just weeks before his arrest.

Carsten L was detained in Berlin in December of last year. A month after arriving in Germany on a flight from the United States, police captured his accused accomplice, Arthur E.

Arthur E, a German businessman born in Russia, is suspected of traveling to Moscow and passing information to Russia’s domestic surveillance agency, the FSB.

According to reports, both individuals have been charged with “treason in a particularly serious case” by Germany’s prosecutor general.

A Berlin court must now determine whether to hear the case.

According to German media, Arthur E was a diamond trader who “babbled like a brook” following his arrest. The two men had supposedly met for the first time in 2021 at a private party at a football club in Bavaria, and Carsten L had told him about his employment at the BND.

The prosecutor’s office has declined to comment on claims that charges had been filed.

Bruno Kahl, the leader of the BND, recently described the situation as a shock to his agency.

However, he told Tagesspiegel that much of the information passed on was of minimal value and that the BND had tightened security measures to avoid such breaches.