Russia continues to intensify subversive activities in Germany, involving “non-professionals,” including Ukrainians residing on German territory.
German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said this at a briefing on Tuesday, according to an Ukrinform correspondent.
“The constitutional order in the country is under attack almost daily,” the politician said.
He noted that over the past year, the number of cases of extremism, Islamism, anti-Semitism “on the streets and on the internet” continued to grow, and attacks on the peaceful democratic order, in particular acts of espionage, sabotage, hybrid (including cyber) attacks and disinformation, have somewhat changed their nature.
According to Dobrindt, last year, foreign special services tried to be active in the political space, as well as in the economic sphere.
“We noted that Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine has led to the fact that our protection against espionage and cyberattacks is constantly and increasingly being questioned. […] In this context, there is a trend toward Russia’s intensified activity,” the minister said.
He said that non-professionals — “untrained lone individuals” or “low-level agents” — are increasingly involved in this type of activity (espionage and sabotage). These people sometimes do not even understand that they are committing serious crimes, but they pose a new level of threat, because for the most part they do not have a criminal past, and they are difficult to identify, and even their arrest does not cause real harm to the special service that recruited these individuals to perform a certain task, like the arrest of a regular agent, Dobrindt said. He stressed that measures were being taken to prevent such acts, and in this context, he mentioned the detention of three Ukrainian citizens last month on suspicion of preparing acts of sabotage.
On May 9-10 this year, three Ukrainians were arrested in Germany and Switzerland for alleged agent activities with the aim of committing acts of sabotage in Germany in favor of “Russian government agencies.” They are accused of agreeing to commit aggravated arson and cause explosions.
In June 2024, citizens of the Russian Federation, Ukraine and Armenia were arrested in Germany on suspicion of espionage. The defendants were charged with working for a “foreign intelligence service.”
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