LONDON—A British lawmaker said Sunday his Russian assistant is facing deportation as a suspected spy. Mike Hancock, a Liberal Democrat member of the House of Commons, said he was unaware that the security services had any suspicions about Katia Zatuliveter, 25, until she was detained.
Hancock, 64, is a member of the European Security and Defense Assembly of the Western European Union, a security and defense organization.
The Sunday Times reported that Home Secretary Theresa May has already approved Zatuliveter’s detention. The Home Office declined to comment, saying it never comments on individual cases.
“She is not a Russian spy. I know nothing about espionage, but she has been subjected to a deportation order,” Hancock said.
“She is appealing it, because she feels, quite rightly, that she has done nothing wrong.”
The Sunday Times said Zatuliveter was stopped and questioned at Gatwick airport in August when she returned to Britain.
Hancock said the security services had never told him of their concerns about Zatuliveter.
“No one has ever said to me under any circumstances whatsoever that she has been involved in anything like that,” he said. “It is now in the hands of her lawyers. I am sure that in the end she will be proved to be right.”
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