Accused Russian spy attended University of Calgary

Open this photo in gallery:

A man who completed graduate studies at the University of Calgary and volunteered in a Canadian election campaign has been detained in Norway on suspicion of working as a Russian spy.

Norwegian authorities arrested Jose Assis Giammaria on Monday on suspicion of being an “illegal,” a term that describes a spy operating with a false identity, according to the Norwegian public broadcaster.

Mr. Giammaria had been affiliated with the University of Tromso, where he was conducting research on Arctic security issues. An academic in Tromso told The Guardian that Mr. Giammaria had been there since December, 2021, and had been recommended by a professor in Canada. Norwegian media described him as a Brazilian citizen suspected of actually being Russian. He has not been charged but is being held awaiting a hearing on deportation.

According to a 2018 convocation notice, Mr. Giammaria graduated from the University of Calgary’s Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies, or CMSS, with a course-based master’s degree.

He also published an article in the Canadian Naval Review in 2019 on the case for placing a Canadian Forces base at the deep water port of Churchill, Man. The article examines why the absence of an Arctic naval base is a potential strategic problem for Canada.

The University of Calgary confirmed that Mr. Giammaria convocated in 2018 but did not say whether the university had been contacted by Canadian security services about this case.

The university said in a statement that students in the strategic studies master’s program are taught by professors and instructors, not military professionals. “No access to information is provided that any other student in any other program wouldn’t have,” the university said.

David Bercuson, who was the director of the CMSS at the time of Mr. Giammari’s graduation and is now director emeritus, said the student’s name was familiar but couldn’t recall much about him.

“I’m shocked. Of course I’m shocked. … We do get some foreign students here but not a lot,” Prof. Bercuson said. “They come here, they study, they do their work and they go on their merry way. But that’s quite weird. … We do have interactions with the Department of National Defence every now and then but not recently.”

Canadian intelligence services have issued warnings to universities, in general, about the need for caution because of potential security threats, including a major campaign in the past few years sounding the alarm about threats to Canadian research. Prof. Bercuson said the warnings he was aware of were never specific to anything going on at CMSS.

A 2015 Carleton University convocation program lists Jose Assis Giammaria as a bachelor of arts honours graduate with high distinction in political science and a concentration in international relations.

Sean Devine, a federal arts funding officer who won election this week as an Ottawa city councillor, remembers Mr. Giammaria as a canvasser on a past campaign.

In 2015, Mr. Devine ran unsuccessfully in the federal election for the NDP. He said Mr. Giammaria showed up shortly after the campaign began. “My campaign was very small so we were taking everybody,” Mr. Devine said.

As far as he knew, Mr. Giammaria was Brazilian.

“He sent me a really impressive résumé and he had a lot of experience in political science and, I think, policy,” he recalled.

He said Mr. Giammaria worked as a “door knocker” for the federal campaign. “He was really good at it and I remember he was asking if he could be more involved in the campaign, as most volunteers typically do.”

Mr. Devine recalls the campaign told him to focus on door knocking. After that, Mr. Giammaria didn’t show as much interest. “He just stopped showing up,” he said.

He speculated the man left because it was apparent Mr. Devine’s 2015 federal election bid would not succeed.

“If he had been looking to attach himself to a winning campaign he may have quickly realized I was not going to be that winning campaign.”

Mr. Devine recalled telling Mr. Giammaria how impressed he was that a Brazilian student studying in Canada wanted to be more involved in campaigns.