Russia jails 71-year-old hypersonic scientist for ‘leaking secrets to the Netherlands’

Russia today jailed one of its most eminent hypersonic scientists for allegedly leaking secrets to a NATO country as a Western diplomat warned that Putin and his spies “see treason lurking around every corner.”

Professor Valery Golubkin, 71, has been sent to a strict regime penal colony for 12 years after being found guilty of high treason by the Moscow City Court.

Golubkin, a professor of aerodynamics at a Moscow institute who is considered a world expert in hypersonic technology, was arrested in 2020 on suspicion of handing over secrets to an unnamed NATO country.

He was reportedly accused of handing over aerodynamics-related information to scientists in the Netherlands.

Golubkin worked for the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and at the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute (TsAGI).

He authored more than 120 scientific articles in the field and participated in theoretical developments while having only the third form of access to state secrets, suggesting that he never worked on “top secret” projects.

Vladimir Putin’s regime has held several prominent scientists on national security charges in the past two years and the FSB security service has been accused of purging some of Russia’s top academics.

Kremlin critics say the arrests are often due to unfounded paranoia, something authorities deny.

Golubkin insisted that no secrets were involved and only shared information authorized by the Russian authorities.

“Putin and his spies now see treason lurking around every corner,” a Western diplomat in Moscow said.

Putin has prioritized the development of hypersonic missile technology, but this has not given him much advantage in the war in Ukraine.

Moscow often boasts that its hypersonic weapons (which can travel at more than five times the speed of sound, or Mach 5) are “unstoppable.”

However, few have been seen in action, and Kiev has said it has been able to shoot down such missiles in a major blow to Putin’s goal of developing an arsenal that can rival that of the United States and other Western nations.

Specifically, Ukraine said in May that it had shot down six Russian Kinzhal (Dagger) missiles. Russia dismissed the kyiv report.

Golubkin’s trail was kept secret.

His lawyer, Alexander Timoshenko, previously said: ‘He does not admit his guilt.

‘He is a theoretical physicist, he explained to me what he was doing, [concerning] theoretical physics. He did not have access to state secrets.

Another Russian colleague and Golubkin’s supervisor, Anatoly Gubanov, was arrested for high treason in December 2020.

Golubkin said that his arrest was related to Gubanov’s testimony and that he passed two of his reports to his co-workers in the Netherlands on Gubanov’s orders.

According to the Russia Free Press, another of Golubkin’s lawyers, Ivan Pavlov, said that the Russian security agency FSB “saw a betrayal in the fact that Golubkin participated in the official international project HEXAFLY-INT (high-speed experimental flying vehicles). “.

He did this, Pavlov said, “under a contract concluded between TsAGI and the European Institute, during which, under the direction of his superiors, he sent reports on the work carried out.”

human rights project Pervy Otdel, said: “Three commissions confirmed that there was no classified information [in the Golubkin case]… Those reports were available to be published and shared with international partners.’