(CNN) -- Russia is checking to see whether an aide to a British lawmaker, who has been arrested and is facing expulsion from the United Kingdom, is a Russian citizen, according to media reports.
London's Sunday Times newspaper said the British intelligence service MI5 determined that Katia Zatuliveter, 25, was a Russian sleeper agent. But the member of Parliament she worked for, Liberal Democrat Mike Hancock, denied on Sunday that she is a spy.
"We are checking right now whether she is a Russian citizen," Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Monday, according to Russian news agencies. He spoke to reporters in Warsaw, Poland, where he is accompanying Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on a state visit.
"If she is indeed a Russian citizen, we will seek consular access to her and will speak to her," Lavrov said, according to the RIA-Novosti news agency.
Hancock said that Zatuliveter was detained Thursday, although the arrest did not become public until Sunday. CNN
