SPY PLOT.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 85, 11 April 1938, Page 5

SPY PLOT.

ARRESTS MADE.

FOUR -MEN, ONE GIRL 1 i DEFENCE PLANS FOUND. .'Special.—By Air Mall.) PARIS, March 21. French Secret Service agents have disclosed details of a spy plot believed j to be the most serious discovered in France since the end of the war. Four, men and a girl, an attractive 23-vear-old brunette, said to be t' •» wife of a French soldier, are under arrest. Further arrests are expected. They are: — Jean Bastide. 23-year-old leatherworker, of Graulhet, in the Tarn Department. Marcel Oustric, a former secretary on the staff of the War Department, also of Graulhet. Amouniirian, an Iranian student, on the registers of the Corbonne, Montpellier and Toulouse Universities. Jean Lassaire, dancer, of Montpellier. Yvonne Talbot, alias Vassilieva, alias Amouniirian, known as "La Belle Tatiana." . Military authorities are disturbed by I the fact that much of the gang's activity was concerned with French defence plans on the Spanish frontier. ' First clue to the ring came last December, when counter-espionage officers discovered that Bastide, who had .just com- , pleted his military service, was seekinp | a foreign buyer for plans of France's . fortifications and air defences ill the Maritime Alps. Implicated Girl. I He was watched night and day until 1 unwittingly, he led his "shadow" tc • Oustric. | At Oustric's home were found a vasi . | collection of plans and diagrams detail iieg the location and natiw* <£ guj

I emplacements, air defence stations and armament stores all along the southeastern frontier. ! He is said to have confessed that, dur- ■ ing his service at the War Office he took ■ copies of all documents and diagrams ' which passed through his hands. i The two men were arrested and gaoled at Marseilles. Questioned, they impli-j rated "La Belle Tatiana." who was staying at Toulouse with Amouniirian. • j An official in touch with the inquiries 1 into the case said: Tatiana. who speaks at least five| language <. deceived most people by her I youth and by her pose as a rather j llighty girl. nevertheless interested ill! 1 ' the international situation and military |: ' matters. ; i Recruited Spies. j r | She mixed with the highest society, linn the French Riviera. Always per-' ilfectly dressed, she was often in the i company of hiu'.i officers of the Services.! most of whom would probably be dU- j mayed to know that she was playing a j leading role in one of the most cunningly |i ■ organised spy plots discovered in France!' - in recent years. | It has been established that she j i travelled frequently from Montpellier to! Paris, where she held long conferences j with Amouniirian. who has been identi- i tied as one of the most notorious spies ' 1 in Europe. i She claimed on arrest to be a Russian i subject, and said that she was married j to a Pole, from whom she had separated. '; s The police, however, declare that, in e the absence of her French soldier-lius-I band, she had been acting as the recruity ing agent for the Intelligence Service of i- a foreign Power. j e Amouniirian. who had fled to Paris I after the arrest of the girl, was traced | i- to the Latin Quarter and imprisoned. | s- Documents found at his house led the | i- hunt to Bayonne, where Lassaire was g arrested as ho was about to leave for '=> Montpellier. I<? He had been planning to open a dance hall in the garrison quarter of Montpellier, which he proposed to run in eonjunction with a money-lendin? office in 0 aTI eiulcavoi'r to contact military men who miaht be in need of funds. Lassaire. police say. ha* recently made st several trips to the headquarters in 1 Irun, anti-Red Spain, of the foreign mj Power i-i.'—«d to few Amoved.