Tens of thousands of diplomats are descending on United Nations headquarters in New York City this week. But while the annual U.N. General Assembly high-level gathering is supposed to center on diplomacy, espionage and security considerations also loom large.
The espionage concern centers on the FBI's role to detect and counter a vast number of intelligence officers hiding among various diplomatic delegations. These intelligence officers hope to evade the FBI scrutiny that falls on colleagues who are stationed in the U.S. full time. Their mission might be to approach a foreign or U.S. government official for recruitment, receive information or materials from an already recruited source, or pursue an altogether more nefarious agenda. The assassination penchant of the Russian intelligence services bears note, as does the Iranian intelligence tradition to reconnoiter New York targets for prospective terrorist attacks. The counterintelligence concern also sometimes extends to allies. French DGSE and Israeli Mossad intelligence officers are notorious for launching unilateral or non-U.S. cooperative intelligence operations during UNGA week. The FBI must consider all these threats and many more.
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That's only one side of the espionage coin.
On the flip side, the FBI will use this week to make approaches to foreign officials previously identified as possibly being willing to spy for the U.S. This involves an FBI-led but CIA-collaborative effort to engage with officials in their hotels, on the street, at restaurants, or in other areas where they are separated from their delegations. It's why, for example, the Chinese foreign and defense ministries insist on their personnel avoiding individual activities. They don't want their people alone and thus vulnerable to the FBI offer of a better life in better paid service of better values.
The National Security Agency also plays a pivotal role during UNGA week, bugging the rooms, computers, and cellphones of foreign officials and listening in on their meetings. To be fair to the Israelis and French, the NSA also bears little notice of alliances in its activities. NSA intelligence collection also supports longer-term insight into the personalities and dynamics at play inside foreign governments. And it helps identify prospective future targets for CIA recruitment approaches.
The security effort to protect visiting dignitaries is equally crucial. Fulfillment of this responsibility is led by the U.S. Secret Service and the State Department's Diplomatic Security Service. The Secret Service protects visiting heads of state such as Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, while the DSS protects ministerial-level dignitaries and designated at-risk VIPs such as Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
Already highly complex, this protective mission is made even more challenging by resource strains. These strains are particularly severe with the DSS. In turn, the NYPD and protection-trained special agents/officers from other federal agencies are also drafted in for support. (Asked what specific protective resources the NYPD provides during UNGA week, a spokesperson sent the Washington Examiner two irrelevant posts on social media.) Fortunately, foreign officials' national protective details can reduce the burdens on the U.S. government. That is especially true when it comes to close relationships between the DSS and protective agencies such as the U.K.'s Metropolitan Police Service's Protection Command. But this opportunity isn't always available.
Prominent controversies such as the war in Ukraine mean the U.S. will provide extensive protective support to both Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Lavrov during their respective UNGA visits. Fortunately, the Secret Service and the DSS maintain excellent relations with Zelensky's security detail and a professional relationship with the Russian FSO. Hostile sentiments toward China and Iran over human rights concerns will similarly require significant U.S. support for those delegations.
Sometimes, however, the protection factor itself poses problems. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's CAT security unit bears particular note here. Thugs as much as they are protection officers, CAT officers have repeatedly attacked nonviolent protesters on U.S. soil. In 2011, they undermined the Secret Service's protection of then-President Barack Obama. A CAT officer also once aggressively shoved a Secret Service agent assigned to protect Erdogan.
Put simply, while UNGA week generates attention for its diplomatic meetings and speeches, you can be sure that much more is going on behind the scenes.