The Threat to the U.K.

The Telegraph notes that Russia is now posing its biggest threat to the security of the United Kingdom since the end of the Cold War:

The revelations that Russia is distracting security services from more pressing threats comes at a sensitive time politically as Gordon Brown prepares to meet President Medvedev for the first time at the G8 summit in Japan.

High on the agenda will be the way Russia's domestic security arm, the FSB, has been raiding the offices of BP's joint venture in Moscow, TNK-BP.

Jonathan Evans, the head of MI5, said last year that "since the end of the Cold War we have seen no decrease in the numbers of undeclared Russian intelligence officers in the UK - at the Russian Embassy and associated organisations conducting covert activity in this country.''

It is estimated there are at least 30 spies based at the Russian embassy in Kensington, west London, controlled by a spymaster known as ''the resident.''