Federal Court to Weigh Espionage Charges Against Biel Pizzaiolo
On October 7, 2026, a 45-year-old pizzaiolo will stand trial at the Federal Criminal Court. He faces federal charges that he operated as an intelligence asset for the Turkish state.
The Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland accuses the man of gathering and transmitting sensitive data on Kurdish individuals to foreign handlers.
WhatsApp Metadata and the Accusation of Foreign Handlers
The federal indictment alleges that between 2018 and 2019, Aslan G. supplied information about supporters of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) to the Turkish intelligence agency MIT and to police in the city of Diyarbakir.
Federal investigators have built their case around dozens of WhatsApp messages and phone call logs extracted from a Swiss mobile number allegedly belonging to G. By forwarding non-public data, prosecutors state that he compromised the safety, freedom, and physical well-being of targeted individuals residing inside Switzerland.
During that time, Turkish authorities detained a Kurdish family man from the canton of Bern. That detained individual is the brother of the owner of the Biel pizzeria where G. was employed at the time. Prosecutors maintain that G. funneled specific intelligence regarding this family man directly to Turkish operatives.
The 2019 Pizzeria Assault and Disputed Digital Records
The origins of the judicial proceedings stretch back to an episode of violence in 2019. Four Kurdish men intercepted G., dragged him into the walk-in freezer of a Biel pizzeria, and subjected him to physical assaults and threats until he signed a confession admitting to espionage against the local Kurdish community. The Tages-Anzeiger broke the story to the public.
The four assailants responsible for the freezer confinement and assault have since been convicted. The foundational digital records and device data underpinning the federal indictment were secured from a mobile phone stripped from G. by his attackers during the 2019 assault.
The Defense Position and Upcoming Proceedings
The defendant, who now operates a pizzeria in the canton of Freiburg, denies all allegations brought against him by federal prosecutors.
He faces formal charges of political intelligence service, the statutory term under Swiss law for espionage conducted on behalf of a foreign power. The Federal Criminal Court trial opens on October 7, 2026, where judges will evaluate the case against the backdrop of the presumption of innocence.
