By Olha Hembik and AFP | 2024-10-31

WARSAW -- The Kremlin is accused of orchestrating a campaign of sabotage throughout NATO countries, including acts of arson.

As Moscow tries to discourage the Western alliance from supporting Ukraine, it "has escalated its hybrid warfare tactics against NATO countries by targeting critical infrastructure across Europe," the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) said in an October 1 report.

It cited crimes investigated by Estonia -- damage to a Baltic gas pipeline and communication cables -- and by the Czech Republic -- a case of arson in Prague.

But many other countries have experienced suspicious attacks on infrastructure that they blame on Russia.

Russian consulate closure

Poland last week took diplomatic action in response to the Kremlin's actions.

Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski on October 22 ordered the closure of the Russian consulate in Poznan over Moscow's alleged "sabotage" attempts in the country.

"I have information that Russia is behind the attempts at sabotage in Poland and in allied countries," Sikorski told reporters. "I have therefore taken the decision to withdraw my permission for the Russian consulate to operate in Poznan."

The imminent closure leaves three Russian consulates in Poland, as well as the embassy.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova vowed a "painful response."

"We demand an end to the hybrid war against Poland and its allies," Sikorski said, reserving "the right to take further decisive action."

Poland ablaze

Sikorski cited a case from January when Polish police arrested a Ukrainian man suspected of plotting to burn down a paint factory in Wroclaw, near strategic infrastructure, Onet media outlet reported October 21.

The man confessed to working for Russian intelligence and said the Kremlin had planned sabotage operations across Europe, Sikorski added.

For example, a massive fire at a shopping center in the northern suburbs of Warsaw on May 12 was one of several in a string of suspicious fires, including at a large garbage dump and at a school during final exams, Germany's DW reported.

The blaze destroyed 1,400 shops, mostly operated by Vietnamese sellers.

"At this point we no longer doubt that the Russian and Belarusian intelligence agencies ... are very active in Poland," Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said at the time.

Russia recruits saboteurs through Telegram, promising recruits €10,000–€15,000 for committing arson in large Polish cities, Rzeczpospolita reported in May.

When police nab amateurs who take payment from strangers online, establishing their link to Russia becomes much harder.

"This is an unprecedented situation. A foreign state uses hired guns to commit sabotage in our country," Tomasz Broniś, a security analyst and former Polish intelligence officer, told the newspaper.

Suspicious fires hit Ukrainian allies

Blazes elsewhere on NATO territory have aroused suspicion of Russian sabotage.

In Berlin, a fire broke out May 3 at a metal factory owned by Diehl Metall Applications, a defense contractor.

Diehl produces IRIS-T SLM air defense systems that Ukraine is using.

"Western security officials now say the fire was set by Russian saboteurs trying [to] disrupt shipments of critical arms and ammunition to Ukraine," the Wall Street Journal reported June 23.

Meanwhile, a fire swept through an IKEA warehouse in Vilnius, Lithuania, in May, and an arsonist tried to set buses on fire in Prague in June.

Polish police arrested nine men after the shopping center fire in May and said they were part of a Russian ring that had set fire to the IKEA facility in Lithuania, the Washington Post reported in July.

Czech authorities arrested a Latin American suspect after the attempted bus burning.

"There's a suspicion that the attack was likely organized and financed from Russia," Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said at the time, according to the Associated Press.

"For a long time, Russia has been using the tactic of mass unrest and upheavals within society with the help of explosions and fires," said Alyona Romanyuk, editor-in-chief of the Ukrainian NGO On the Other Side of Putin's Lies.

Russia commits those acts to "demoralize society and compound everyone's fears for his [or her] life, health and safety," she told Kontur.

'Chaos and destabilization'

Another tactic is to turn Western countries against each other or against their own minorities.

"It's Russia's typical MO: it's simply trying to distort the [worldwide] image of Poles: look at that, in Poland they burn down Vietnamese stores," said Mykola Davydiuk, a political analyst and author of "How Putin's Propaganda Works."

Russian President Vladimir Putin knows how to conduct influence operations because "he grew up on them," he told Kontur, referring to Putin's KGB background.

"Russia is currently responsible for 80% of influence operations in Europe," Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky said at a conference in Prague on October 9.

Europe needs to gear up its vigilance to counter such threats, he said.

"We need much more determination in the fight against Kremlin influence than we have shown so far," Lipavsky said. "The solution lies in strategic communication, sanctions, exposing crimes and utilizing existing legal measures."

Ukrainian security agencies announced in July the arrest of 19 accused arsonist recruiters.

The detainees, acting on Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) instructions, allegedly were plotting multiple acts of arson mainly in Ukraine, Poland and the Baltic countries.

"For the arson attacks in Poland, the [Russian] intelligence agencies deliberately hired people with Ukrainian passports," said Serhii Zhukov, an analyst at Ukraine's Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security.

Once Ukrainian citizens are arrested in Poland on suspicion of sabotage, Russian propagandists gain "another argument for withholding assistance from Ukrainian refugees," he told Kontur.

"The Kremlin's goal is chaos and destabilization."