Prime Minister Taavi Rõivas said that this was first time in the history of Estonia following the restoration of the country's independence that the government had made a decision like this.

In the proposal to deprive Viktoria Dressen of her Estonian citizenship, the Minister of the Interior stated that this person had been convicted of treason, disclosure of internal information and other offenses, spokespeople for the government said on Wednesday.

Dressen had filed an application for naturalization at a time when they had been acting against the Republic of Estonia and its security as instructed by the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB) for more than five years.

Considering that she had acted as instructed by the Russian FSB and in its interests, submitted false information as well as concealed facts when applying for citizenship, the Ministry of the Interior had proposed that the government strip her of her Estonian citizenship.

The government revoked the Estonian citizenship of her husband Aleksei Dressen in Oct. 2015 on the basis of an application filed by him at the end of August of that year.

Aleksei and Viktoria Dressen were arrested at Tallinn Airport on the morning of Feb. 22, 2012 after Aleksei had seen his wife off to a flight bound for moscow. Data carrying media was found on the woman containing information that she was supposed to deliver to the Russian inteligence service.

Dressen, a former officer of the Estonian Internal Security Service (KaPo), was sentenced to 16 years in jail by an Estonian court in July 2012 for passing on classified information to Russia. Viktoria Dressen was found guilty of treason and abetting the disclosure of internal information and handed a conditional sentence of six years in prison.

On Sept. 26 this year, Aleksei Dressen was swapped for Eston Kohver, a KaPo officer who had been jailed over a year prior in Russia, on a bridge spanning the Piusa River at the Kunichina Gora border checkpoint.

Under law, a person is deprived of Estonian citizenship by an order of the government if they enter the public service or military service of a foreign state without the permission of the Estonian government, if they join the intelligence or security service of a foreign state or an armed organization of such a state which is set up in accordance with military principles or which engages in military exercises, if they have attempted to change the constitutional order of Estonia by force, or if they submit false information to conceal facts which would have precluded the granting or restoration of Estonian citizenship to them.