BBC News with David Austin.
Ten suspected Russian spies currently appearing in a New York court have entered guilty pleas. The ten men and women were arrested in the United States last week
on suspicion of
running a long-term spy ring. From outside the court in New York, Madeleine Morris has just sent this report.
To a courtroom packed with supporters, family members, lawyers and media, the five men and five women pleaded guilty to acting as agents for Russia. It
emerge
d they had reached a plea agreement, but their admission of guilt, a more serious charge of money laundering, was dropped. There was a
glimpse
of the life that now awaits the ten when they are immediately returned to the country they tried to provide information to. The lawyer for one defendant, Vicky Pelaez, said Russian officials had promised her a lifetime monthly payment of 2,000 dollars, free housing, and all-expenses-paid visits from her children. It’s unclear if the other nine people were given a similar deal.
And within the past few minutes, the judge in the case of the ten Russian agents has ordered all of them to be
deport
ed and, in an apparent swap, a US prosecutor told the New York judge that the Russian government had agreed to release prisoners held in Russia.
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