For the first time, evidence has been found that Russia planned sabotage and even terrorist attacks on NATO territory. This is reported by The Washington Post on the authority of the Polish intelligence services, which managed to expose a Russian plot.
At the beginning of this year, cryptic vacancies appeared online, specifically on Russian-language Telegram channels, mainly visited by refugees from eastern Ukraine who had settled in Poland. It involved small tasks such as putting up flyers, and the pay was very meagre, but for some, the promise of quick money was too good to pass up.
But soon, the catch emerged: the jobs consisted of spreading Russian propaganda in the name of an anonymous employer. And for those who still wanted to complete the assignments, the work later took an even more ominous turn.
Trains
According to Polish investigators, after just a few weeks, the “recruits” were tasked with scouting Polish ports, placing cameras along railways and hiding tracking devices in military cargo transport. New orders came in March: to derail trains carrying weapons to Ukraine.
Polish authorities and US intelligence agencies now believe that the “anonymous employer” was the Russian military intelligence agency GRU. The exposed operation posed the most severe Russian threat to NATO territory since Moscow invaded Ukraine early last year. The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has not yet responded to the report.
“Very dangerous threshold crossed.”
If successful, the plan could have both slowed arms shipments to Ukraine (some 80 percent of military hardware from the west is shipped through Poland) and fueled the resentment against the 1.5 million Ukrainians who have fled to Poland since the start of the war. And even if it failed, the damage was limited to Moscow. Displaced Ukrainians, in particular, would end up in prison instead of their spies.
“This plot has crossed a perilous threshold,” Stanislaw Zaryn, head of Poland’s security services, said in an interview with The Washington Post. “This is the first sign that the Russians are trying to organise sabotage and even terrorist attacks in Poland and NATO territory.”
Wider threat
Investigators have since found evidence that Russia was planning other deadly operations. Recruits would have been ordered to carry out arson attacks and even murder. The targets were not disclosed. “This threat has been eliminated, but the broader threat remains,” one of the investigators said anonymously.
Poland emphasises that most Ukrainian suspects come from the eastern provinces, traditionally more likely to be pro-Russian. However, they seemed to be motivated more by money than ideology.