How is ethnicity represented in 2 episodes of Spooks? Compare them.

The two episodes of spooks I've decided to compare are Spooks series 8, episode 3 and episode 2. To summarise briefly episode 3 features a stunt by a group of Marxist revolutionaries who capture some businessmen and hold them on trial. Episode 2 was about diplomatic struggles as a central asian nation wants to assassinate a dissident in London.
The stereotypical representations of ep 3 are that the 'bad guys' consist of a russian woman and a french man. The american diplomat is heavy handed and represents a 'gung-ho' style of intervention. He dominates the english home secretary and gets his way. The representation of russian and french people as the bad guys is right out of the history of english spy thrillers - look to the villains of the James Bond films for examples. There's also a scene where an english businessman is being tried and he sticks to the attitude of keeping a stiff upper lip and dying with as much dignity as he can muster. This is a stereotypical representation of the english people.


By contrast ep 2 was careful not to name any actual nation, instead referring to a fictional one called Tazbekstan. Presumably it was inspired by asian nations as a whole and in keeping with english spy thriller tradition it ooses of cold-war tensions, right down to the over-pronounced accents of the Tazbek representatives and frequent references to historical events (such as the russian bolshevik revolution).
When it becomes apparent that the UK government will have to trade with the russians they take a long time arguing over it and it's presented as not an easy decision. This represents a long-standing dislike of russia by western governments, which has thawed slightly in recent years.
I think the producers didn't want to name an actual central asian nation because it might actually cause a real-life diplomatic incident and that they didn't cover up for russia because it's somehow more politically correct to display them as the enemy.