Details of spy emerge

Ryan Fogle, whom Moscow accused of trying to recruit a Russian intelligence official, wowed his bosses as an intern for Jon Alterman, head of the Middle East Programme at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, said Yousef Casewit, who says he shared a cubicle with Fogle as a fellow intern with the programme in 2005.

“We all worked hard, but he was actually quite exceptional,” Casewit, a Ph.D. candidate in Islamic studies at Yale University, told RIA Novosti. “It seemed like he was really out to join the DC kind of rat race.”

A smattering of details about Fogle’s life began to surface after the diplomat, who served as a third secretary in the US Embassy’s political department in Moscow, was nabbed by Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB). Local media in St. Louis reported that Fogle (29) graduated high school from Mary Institute and St. Louis Country Day School in 2002. Meredith Aylward, who graduated with Fogle from the school, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that she did not envision Fogle becoming a diplomat.

“I’d see him doing engineering or something like that,” Aylward, 29, was quoted by the newspaper as saying Wednesday. “He was definitely friendly but also quiet. He was very studious.”

Matt Hames, a spokesman for Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, told RIA Novosti on Wednesday that Fogle graduated with a double major in political science and international relations in 2006.

Casewit said he recalls that Fogle focused on China’s relations with countries in the Middle East during the internship, though he conceded that while they sat next to each other in the office, their topics of interest did not overlap much.

Fogle worked more closely with another intern, Michael Ortiz, who is listed on a White House-affiliated website as director for legislative affairs with the White House’s National Security Staff. Ortiz previously served as a spokesman for US President Barack Obama while the president was still a US senator. Fogle, Ortiz and Casewit are listed as interns at the CSIS Middle East program in a 2005 paper about Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood that was written by Haim Malka, the program’s deputy director.

Ortiz did not respond to a request for comment sent to the email listed at the White House-affiliated website, and he did not return a telephone message seeking comment that RIA Novosti left with his office.

White House National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said the White House is not commenting on the accusations against Fogle and does not discuss staff below “the senior director” level.

Casewit said Fogle was “brilliant” and “hard-working” during his CSIS internship, but that he seemed to lack in certain social graces. He wasn’t the type that would hang around and chat,” Casewit told RIA Novosti. “He just wanted get his work done. He really wanted to prove himself: He’d come early and leave late.”

Andrew Schwartz, a CSIS spokesman, confirmed to RIA Novosti on Wednesday that Fogle had indeed worked as an intern with the think tank’s Middle East program. Rebecka Shirazi, the coordinator for the program, said both Alterman and Malka were traveling Wednesday and unavailable for comment. During his time at Colgate, Fogle appeared to have been a member of the Phi Delta Theta fraternity, tutored students in Arabic, and helped arrange for a comedian from the popular US comedy news program “The Daily Show” to give a lecture at the university, according to his online footprint.

In the fraternity’s Winter 2010-2011 newsletter, an alumni update entry for Fogle states that he “sends his greetings from Virginia!” and lists the address of a McLean, Virginia, address at which fellow members can write to him. — Ria Novosti.