An accused Russian spy who worked as an assistant for a British lawmaker told a London court today that she was not a secret agent, although she had had a four-year affair with her boss.



Ekaterina Zatuliveter, 26, was arrested in December on suspicion of using her job in the office of Liberal Democrat legislator Mike Hancock to pass information to Russian intelligence.



She was not charged, but British authorities want to deport her as a danger to national security.



Zatuliveter denies spying and is asking the Special Immigration Appeals Commission to block her extradition.



Hancock, a 65-year-old Liberal Democrat member of Parliament who sits on the House of Commons Defense Committee, today denied in a statement that he had passed Zatuliveter "any information that was not in the public domain."



compiled from agency reports