MOSCOW, June 3 (RAPSI) – The Vilnius District Court has upheld a lower court decision to detain a Russian citizen on suspicion of espionage, RIA Novosti reported on Wednesday. 

The Lithuanian Prosecutor General’s Office announced in early May that a suspected Russian spy, born in 1977, was arrested on April 29 following an extensive counterespionage operation. On April 30, the Vilnius court approved the prosecutors’ request and issued a warrant for the three-month detention of the suspect.

Identified only by his initials N.F., the Russian national appealed the ruling.

The Russian embassy, which has promised to provide the necessary assistance to the suspect, declined to comment.

According to the press release, the detainee was an employee of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB). He allegedly carried out an intelligence operation aimed at infiltrating Lithuania’s government institutions, law-enforcement and intelligence services.

The Lithuanian Prosecutor General’s Office’s Organized Crime and Corruption Investigation Department is conducting a pretrial investigation of this case in cooperation with the State Security Department. Under Article 119 of Part II of Lithuania’s Criminal Code, penalties for this crime range from three to 15 years in prison.

It is the fourth spy case opened in Lithuania over the last few years.

Last year Lithuania arrested two of its own citizens on charges of supplying classified information to Belarus and possibly to Russia. It also expelled three Russian spies in 2014 working under diplomatic immunity.