Spy ring: Anna’s ex says her father was in the KGB

The ex-husband of alleged spy Anna Chapman has revealed her father was a KGB agent. Alex Chapman spoke after he had been visited by an MI5 officer investigating whether Anna, who is in custody in the US for her alleged part in a Russian spy ring, had been a threat to security during her time in Britain.

Meanwhile, another suspect in the 'deep cover' spy ring has reportedly confessed to being a Russian agent.

Alex Chapman married Anna Kuschenko – her maiden name – in Moscow in 2002, five months after meeting her in a London nightclub. It was during their honeymoon in Zimbabwe that Anna introduced Alex to her father, Vasily Kuschenko, who she said was there to represent Russia "in certain areas of government", according to the Daily Telegraph.

Anna told Alex her father had been a senior KGB agent in "old Russia".

He didn't trust anyone," says 30-year-old Chapman, who is now a trainee psychologist living with his parents in the New Forest. "He asked me why I had chosen a Russian bride and asked what business I had in Russia, and I said none.

"He was scary. He would never introduce me to other Russian people who came to the house and he always seemed to have a lot more security than the other diplomats. He had a Land Rover with blacked out windows and there was always one car in front of it and one car behind," he said, adding that he believed her father controlled everything in her life and that she would have done anything for him.

In London, Anna took a series of highly paid jobs, including with Barclays small business banking division and the hedge fund Navigator Asset Management. The Chapmans divorced in 2006, but have kept in touch ever since.

Anna returned to Russia following the divorce, but moved to the US in 2007 to set up an internet business. She was arrested at the weekend after meeting with an undercover US agent posing as a Russian spy and denied bail in a court hearing on Monday.

"When I saw that she had been arrested on suspicion of spying it didn't come as much of a surprise to be honest," says Alex, who was interviewed by MI5 on Wednesday.

He said she had fallen in with a group of rich Russians towards the end of their relationship. "I don't think she was working as a spy here but I suspect she had been conditioned towards that end," he says.

Meanwhile in the US, where 10 people are in custody for their alleged part in the Russian spy ring, prosecutors have claimed one suspect, Juan Lazaro, has admitted to working for Russia's foreign intelligence service and that the house where he and his wife and co-defendant lived was paid for by Russian intelligence.

Prosecutors revealed the new information in the face of growing public scepticism at the allegations against the suspects, who are being portrayed as feckless and hopelessly out-of-date for their elaborate schemes to obtain information that is available to anybody over the internet.

They are desperate to ensure the suspects are denied bail, pointing to the case of Christopher Metsos, the alleged paymaster for the spy ring, who skipped bail in Cyprus on Wednesday and who is now the subject of a manhunt.

"There is little need here for speculation as to what will happen if the defendants are permitted to walk out of the court," they said. "As Metsos did, they will flee." Despite this, the judge granted Lazaro's wife, Vicky Palaez, bail of $250,000 – although she must wear an electronic tag. ·