Western security officials suspect Russian intelligence was behind a plot to put incendiary devices in packages on cargo planes headed to North America, including one that caught fire at a courier hub in Germany and another that ignited in a warehouse in England.
Poland last month said that it had arrested four people suspected to be linked to a foreign intelligence operation that carried out sabotage and was searching for two others. Lithuania’s prosecutor general Nida Grunskiene on Tuesday said that there were an unspecified number of people detained in several countries, offering no elaboration.
The events come as Western officials say they are seeing an intensification of a hybrid war of sabotage by Russia targeting Ukraine’s allies, including election disinformation and arson attacks in Europe this year.
Photo: AP
Several officials said they believe the attacks were the work of Russian military intelligence, the GRU, although Moscow denied involvement.
Poland’s Internal Security Agency, or ABW, said that incidents in Poland, as well as other EU and NATO members, had intensified this year.
The ABW believes the incidents are initiated and coordinated by the Russian special services.
So far, 20 people have been charged in investigations led by the prosecutors’ office, the ABW and police.
Polish Prosecutor Katarzyna Calow-Jaszewska said the investigation focuses on foreign agents conducting acts of sabotage, including damaging industrial facilities or critical infrastructure such as airports, airplanes and other vehicles, and as well as arson using self-combustible parcels sent to EU countries and the UK that would ignite during road or air transport.
The group tested a channel for sending such parcels to the US and Canada, Calow-Jaszewska said.
The Wall Street Journal first reported the details of the cargo plane incidents.
The US Transportation Security Administration (TSA) said it has put extra security measures in place in the past few months for some cargo shipments heading to the US.
“We continually adjust our security posture as appropriate and promptly share any and all relevant information with our industry partners, to include requirements and recommendations that help them reduce risk,” the TSA said.
Dirk Heinrichs, a spokesman for DHL in Germany, said in an e-mailed statement that the company could not provide details about the matter, but was “fully cooperating with the relevant authorities to protect our people, our network and our customers’ shipments.”
The head of Britain’s domestic intelligence agency, MI5, last month said that the UK is facing a “staggering rise” in attempts at assassination, sabotage and other crimes on its soil by Russia as well as Iran.
Calow-Jaszewska on Oct. 25 said that parcels with camouflaged explosives were sent via cargo companies to EU countries and Britain to “test the transfer channel for such parcels” that were ultimately destined for the US and Canada.
The incendiary devices in Germany and the UK both ignited in July.
One was at a stopover at a DHL logistics center at an airport in the city of Leipzig, according to Thomas Haldenwang, head of the Germany’s domestic intelligence agency.
German news agency dpa reported that the connecting flight containing the package, which came from one of the Baltic nations, was delayed in Leipzig and was on the ground when it ignited and set fire to a freight container.
British counterterrorism police are investigating whether Russian agents were behind an incendiary device in a parcel that caught fire in a DHL warehouse in Minworth, near Birmingham, England, on July 22.
The incident, first reported by the Guardian and German broadcasters, was similar to the one in Germany.
Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza also reported that a fire was reported in a courier truck near Warsaw.
“We are observing aggressive action by the Russian intelligence services. In particular Russian espionage and sabotage in Germany are on the rise, both quantitatively and qualitatively,” Haldenwang told the German Budestag last month while discussing the Leipzig incident. “The activities of Russian intelligence services in the real world as well as in cyberspace show that Germany is the focus of this Russia’s hybrid war against Western democracies.”
Indonesia and Malaysia have become the first countries to block Grok, the artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot developed by Elon Musk’s xAI, after authorities said it was being misused to generate sexually explicit and nonconsensual images. The moves reflect growing global concern over generative AI tools that can produce realistic images, sound and text, while existing safeguards fail to prevent their abuse. The Grok chatbot, which is accessed through Musk’s social media platform X, has been criticized for generating manipulated images, including depictions of women in bikinis or sexually explicit poses, as well as images involving children. Regulators in the two Southeast Asian
COMMUNIST ALIGNMENT: To Lam wants to combine party chief and state presidency roles, with the decision resting on the election of 200 new party delegates next week Communist Party of Vietnam General Secretary To Lam is seeking to combine his party role with the state presidency, officials said, in a move that would align Vietnam’s political structure more closely to China’s, where President Xi Jinping (習近平) heads the party and state. Next week about 1,600 delegates are to gather in Hanoi to commence a week-long communist party congress, held every five years to select new leaders and set policy goals for the single-party state. Lam, 68, bade for both top positions at a party meeting last month, seeking initial party approval ahead of the congress, three people briefed by
The Chinese Embassy in Manila yesterday said it has filed a diplomatic protest against a Philippine Coast Guard spokesman over a social media post that included cartoonish images of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Jay Tarriela and an embassy official had been trading barbs since last week over issues concerning the disputed South China Sea. The crucial waterway, which Beijing claims historic rights to despite an international ruling that its assertion has no legal basis, has been the site of repeated clashes between Chinese and Philippine vessels. Tarriela’s Facebook post on Wednesday included a photo of him giving a
ICE DISPUTE: The Trump administration has sought to paint Good as a ‘domestic terrorist,’ insisting that the agent who fatally shot her was acting in self-defense Thousands of demonstrators chanting the name of the woman killed by a US federal agent in Minneapolis, Minnesota, took to the city’s streets on Saturday, amid widespread anger at use of force in the immigration crackdown of US President Donald Trump. Organizers said more than 1,000 events were planned across the US under the slogan “ICE, Out for Good” — referring to the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is drawing growing opposition over its execution of Trump’s effort at mass deportations. The slogan is also a reference to Renee Good, the 37-year-old mother shot dead on Wednesday in her
RSS