Final Word from Monday, December 31, 2018
Czechs were so enthralled at the end of the year with the amateurs at the BIS counterintelligence agency and the pros at Huawei and ZTE that they totally forgot about the inconspicuous but reliable spylet Agáta. Nowhere in the public part of the BIS annual report do we find mention of the reported disappearance of perhaps as many as eight of the nine Agáta IMSI-catcher eavesdropping devices bought by the ÚZSI civilian espionage agency when Milan Chovanec oversaw it as the interior ministry. Where are you, dear Agáta? Are you hiding in Pilsen, or perhaps Toronto? The Agáta story broke earlier this year when Chovanec was still battling to maintain control over ÚZSI, but even Andrej Babiš's media now have gone silent. This has led to rumors of a no-questions-asked deal if the devices are quietly returned. No one knows for sure where poor Agáta is, but she knows where you are. Send her a New Year's SMS. She'll get it, no matter where you send it. [ Czech Republic Office for Foreign Relations and Information CIA China Chinese NÚKIB ]
Glossary of difficult words
where art thou - where are you;
to enthrall - to capture the fascinated attention of;
inconspicuous - not clearly visible or attracting attention;
spylet - (rare) little spy;
IMSI-catcher - a telephone eavesdropping device used for intercepting mobile phone traffic and tracking location data of mobile phone users;
ÚZSI - Office for Foreign Relations and Information; the Czech equivalent of the CIA;
no questions asked - a policy of not asking questions, esp. in a situation where questions would be expected.