European intelligence agencies have warned their governments that Russia is preparing "violent acts of sabotage across the continent", without concern for possible civilian casualties. The Financial Times writes this in its online edition, citing intelligence service officials.
According to the sources, «Russia has already begun to more actively prepare in secret bomb attacks and arson attacks to damage infrastructure on European territory, directly and indirectly».
In particular, the FT mentions the head of the German internal security services, Thomas Haldenwang, who last month - in a conference - stated that the risk of acts of sabotage "has increased significantly". Russia, he added, now appears comfortable carrying out operations on European soil "with a high potential for damage."
Haldenwang spoke a few days after the arrest of two Russian-German citizens in Bayreuth, Bavaria, accused of plotting to attack military and logistics sites in Germany on behalf of Russia.
A similar case had also happened in the United Kingdom: at the end of April, the article recalls, two men were accused of setting fire to a warehouse containing aid for Ukraine, acting on a mandate from Moscow.
Ditto in Sweden, where Stockholm security services are investigating a series of recent train derailments and suspect they are acts of sabotage "backed by a hostile state".
Russia also attempted to destroy the signaling systems of the Czech railways, the Czech Transport Minister told the FT last month.
Furthermore, according to the Estonian internal security service, it was Russian intelligence men who attacked the Interior Minister's cars and those of some journalists in February. Finally, the French Ministry of Defense also warned this year of possible sabotage actions by Russia against military sites.
(Unioneonline/lf)