European law enforcement agencies announced Friday they have identified 22 individuals connected to a coordinated campaign of explosive package attacks throughout Europe last year, with investigators pointing to Russia’s military intelligence service as the orchestrating force.
The incidents involved detonations at shipping facilities across Britain, Germany, and Poland, with security experts believing these attacks served as rehearsals for a broader Russian scheme targeting cargo aircraft headed to the United States.
Russian officials have consistently rejected any involvement in these operations or broader allegations of conducting sabotage campaigns, including arson incidents, designed to undermine nations supporting Ukraine.
Eurojust, which coordinates criminal investigations across European Union member states, revealed that investigators from Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Britain, and Lithuania worked together to identify the suspects located in Lithuania and Poland, all allegedly operating under direction from Russia’s GRU intelligence service.
“The suspected perpetrators were recruited from Russia, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and Ukraine and were often in a vulnerable socio-economic situation,” the Eurojust statement said.
“It is suspected that the acts carried out by these suspects were executed on behalf of the military-intelligence service of the Russian Federation.”
Russia’s defense ministry, which oversees military intelligence operations, has not yet responded to requests for comment. Moscow routinely dismisses such accusations as anti-Russian sentiment.
Lithuania’s Deputy General Prosecutor Arturas Urbelis announced during a news briefing that five individuals holding Russian, Ukrainian, and Lithuanian citizenship will face terrorism charges in Lithuanian courts, with potential sentences reaching 10 years imprisonment upon conviction.
Lithuanian authorities reported that four packages containing “self-made, explosive-incendiary charges” were dispatched from Vilnius on July 19, 2024.
One package being handled by DHL ignited at Leipzig airport in eastern Germany just before workers planned to load it onto a Britain-bound aircraft, according to Lithuanian officials.
A second explosive device detonated aboard a DPD delivery truck traveling through Poland, while a third package exploded inside a DHL storage facility in Birmingham, England.
The fourth package, also transported by DPD truck in Poland, failed to activate due to technical problems, investigators reported. None of these incidents resulted in injuries.
Eurojust investigators also discovered evidence of two ‘test packages’ sent to destinations in the United States and Canada, along with two additional parcels intercepted in Amsterdam that were destined for North American locations.
British law enforcement confirmed that counter-terrorism specialists continue investigating the Birmingham explosion. Last year, authorities arrested a Romanian citizen on charges of assisting foreign intelligence services before releasing him pending further investigation.
“The strength of cooperation in this case has led us to collectively identify what we believe to be Russian military intelligence involvement in a series of incidents across Europe,” said Vicki Evans, Britain’s Senior National Coordinator for Counter Terrorism Policing.
