The former head of Germany’s top foreign intelligence agency was arrested on Tuesday on suspicion of attempted treason and espionage, suspected of selling state secrets to foreign powers.
August Hanning, 80, who was the head of Germany’s equivalent to the CIA, the Federal Intelligence Service, from 1998 to 2005, was arrested along with a former aide, identified as Manfred D. Germany’s federal prosecutor’s office said Hanning was “strongly suspected of treasonous espionage, spying out state secrets, attempted treason, and espionage.” The two are accused of giving classified information to a foreign intelligence service over the course of several years, though the identity of the foreign intelligence service wasn’t revealed.
“Hanning was in close contact with a representative of another foreign intelligence service, to whom he passed on political information, partially based on material provided by Manfred D., for several years,” the federal prosecutor’s office said, adding that it wasn’t known whether the material reached its intended destination.
Manfred D. is alleged to have played a central role in the scheme. In his role as chief of staff for several BND presidents from 2012 to 2026, he had continued access to classified information, which he secretly passed to Hanning in exchange for payment.
“The current findings suggest that, over the years, Manfred D. provided Hanning with approximately 2,000 documents, many of which contained classified information to be used exclusively by the federal intelligence service for internal purposes, particularly for executive intelligence briefings,” the statement said.
While the statement said Hanning mainly used the information for his own private consulting work, on at least one occasion, he was accused of having “used classified intelligence provided by Manfred D. to draft an analysis for an officer of a foreign intelligence service.”
FRIEDRICH MERZ SAYS HE WILL STAY IN POWER DESPITE ANOTHER LOSS TO AFD: ‘DISASTER’
Manfred D. and Hanning’s scheme was alleged to have begun in 2010, and the first evidence was only uncovered last year when police searched Hanning’s residence as part of an entirely unrelated investigation connected to the Christina Block child abduction case.
The accusations are unprecedented in modern German history. No head of German intelligence services has been accused of conspiring with foreign intelligence agencies since Adm. Wilhelm Canaris, the head of Nazi Germany’s military intelligence, who was caught secretly supplying intelligence to the Allies throughout World War II. He was hanged on April 9, 1945, just weeks before the end of the war in Europe.