Egisto Ott, Austrian secret agent in Putin’s service, and his “spy” relationships with a carabiniere from Udine. This is what emerges from an article published on Corriere della Sera, written by Mara Gergolet. Ott, according to what Gergolet writes, is an old acquaintance of the Italian services. So attached to our country that he signed himself, in the dispatches he sent to Jan Marsalek, with the name “Giovanni Parmigiano”. But now that Egisto Ott is under arrest in Vienna, it is also necessary to ask what use he made of his Italian contacts? In Vienna, the police are also investigating this.
The connection with the Russians
“The sad thing is that Egisto Ott was one of the best agents Austria has had,” one investigator said. Egisto arrived in Rome in 2001: liaison agent between Austria and Italy. Born in Carinthia 62 years ago, Italian mother, perfectly bilingual. These are the years of Islamic terrorism, collaboration with Vienna will be important. Ott becomes friends with some of our best cops. In 2010 he goes to Istanbul. And it is there – he suspects – in the open port frequented by Chechens and Caucasians, Syrians and Russians, that he would be hooked by the Kremlin’s men. Returning to his homeland in 2012, he will lead the undercover agents. He is a close friend and will become personal assistant to Martin Weiss, operational head of the Austrian services Bvt (later disbanded). But something is starting to not add up. Weiss, meanwhile, met Jan Marsalek. He is number 2 of Wirecard, the German online payments company, among the 30 companies on the Dax stock exchange, which will collapse like a house of cards; but he is also already an asset (agent vliyaniya, agent of influence operated by the Russians) and later a recruiter on behalf of Moscow where he will escape in 2020.
The suspension
It is important to note the dates – we read in the piece –. In 2017 the British warned Vienna that there was a “mole” among them: and they pointed to Egisto Ott. However, no decisive evidence emerged. Ott is suspended for six months, his access to the EU police databases is removed, but he keeps his official email. He is moved to teach the craft to recruits at the Academy. In 2021, the second suspension. His boss Weiss, however, fled to Dubai in 2018. Here he creates a private intelligence company, which he will put at the service of Marsalek and the Russians. His man in Vienna is “Giovanni Parmigiano”. Egisto Ott’s indictment is 530 pages long. A small newspaper from Bolzano, Salto, and the investigative journalist Christoph Franceschini were the first to talk about the “Italian” trend, stating that the “traces of Egisto Ott lead to Alto Adige”. The Viennese indictment confirms them. Egisto Ott made many phone calls in Italy: to the head of the flying squad of a large city, to men from the Aise, to generals of the Carabinieri and police officials. Work. But it is those to two ROS agents, and in particular to an agent stationed in Udine (now retired) that are – in the eyes of the Austrian investigators – particularly suspicious.
The investigations
In 2021, Vienna asks the Venice Prosecutor’s Office for international assistance on his case. He will be investigated without leading to any indictment. Ott, suspended and without access to the databases, repeatedly asks his Friulian contact to do some research, passing it off as information between colleagues. “What do the Italian police know about…?”; “Are there traces in Italy of…?”. The list of those targeted is a map of the interests of Putin’s repressive machine in Europe. There are Dmitry Senin, an FSB officer who defected (now under arrest in Montenegro) and his sister Irina Mololkina. There is Maria Borodunova, on whom the Latvian tabloids had gone wild: 36 years old, ex-girlfriend of a basketball star, she is actually the lover of Arkady Rotenberg, the oligarch, childhood friend and judo partner of Vladimir Putin. Maria, as reported by the Milanese newspaper, is the owner of a 60 million penthouse in Monte Carlo. Can you check Luca B., asks Egisto Ott, if she went with her sister Viktorija to the Baglioni in Venice? “Affirmative,” is the answer. There is Stanislav Petlinsky, an all-rounder in Putin’s inner circle who will organize Marsalek’s escape to Moscow via Minsk: will the research be used to guarantee a “safe” passage to Europe? Italian and Libyan names appear, such as Elbashir Shkahi (passed “twice through Fiumicino” in 2016, reports Luca B.). Requests and responses go around WhatsApp, outside the protocols. Once Luca asks for time because “the boss controls access”. Nonetheless, the ROS carabiniere has always stated that he did not know of Ott’s suspension and that he considered those requests “official”. It is no coincidence that, also to protect himself, he generally registered them. In Vienna prison Egisto Ott professes his innocence, he says he pays for being “a maverick”. How was he able to remain in his post after the suspicions of 2017 – asks Gergolet -, what cover did he enjoy in the Interior Ministry directed by that Herbert Kickl – the “radical” heir of Jörg Haider – who could be the next Austrian Chancellor and is the most pro-Russian leader in Europe?
