Russia is recruiting Danish citizens to help it plan sabotage attacks against Danish defense companies linked to Ukraine, the Danish national security and intelligence service PET said today.
Hybrid warfare and sabotage on European soil have again drawn attention this week after Germany accused Russia of an attempted drone attack on Leipzig/Halle airport, prompting European Union members to call for new sanctions against Russia.
"Russia is both planning and carrying out sabotage against defense companies and the defense industry in Europe," Emil Gresholm, head of PET, said in a statement.
"We see that Danish companies are also targets of specific Russian sabotage plans and that Russian intelligence services are actively preparing sabotage directed against the defense industry in Denmark," he said.
Russian Ambassador to Denmark Vladimir Barbin said that Gresholm had not presented any concrete evidence to support these allegations.
"Gresholm's statements should also be seen as an admission that Copenhagen's reckless involvement in the conflict in Ukraine and the transformation of Danish territory into a production and logistical support base for the Ukrainian armed forces poses a security risk to Denmark and its citizens," Barbin said.
Germany was investigating a suspected arson attack outside a defense company in Munich on Monday, days after two attempts to sabotage the power grid and a month after a drone attack on an airport that Berlin and its allies blamed on Russia.
Police have arrested two people suspected of throwing incendiary devices and starting a fire at a construction site at the headquarters of Rohde & Schwarz, whose products include radar systems for detecting, tracking and jamming drones, Reuters reports.
The suspects, a 28-year-old woman and a 38-year-old man, both Bulgarian citizens, were arrested at a nearby gas station, police in the German state of Bavaria said. The fire did not cause any significant damage and no one was injured, officials said. The company, Rohde & Schwarz, confirmed that police and firefighters had intervened near its premises. Bulgarian Interior Minister Ivan Demerdzhiev promised cooperation but declined to provide details.
Germany is at the center of European concerns this week about the vulnerability of critical infrastructure.
Allies have stood by Germany after Berlin attributed an August drone attack on Leipzig/Halle airport to Moscow, labeling it part of a hybrid war aimed at intimidating and dividing countries supporting Ukraine since the start of a full-scale Russian invasion in 2022.
As investigations continue and the European Union considers new sanctions, Russia has vehemently denied involvement and said today it would close the cultural centers of Germany's Goethe Institute, in retaliation for similar moves by Berlin. Poland and Britain have summoned Russian diplomats for talks, as have other European allies.
German Foreign Minister Johann Wadeful hailed the “impressive display of solidarity” at a meeting with his Polish and French counterparts, adding: “I believe that its influence has not gone unnoticed in Moscow either.”
Police this week investigated two attempts to sabotage the electricity grid within 24 hours in the federal states of Brandenburg and North Rhine-Westphalia.
Authorities have said they cannot rule out the involvement of either foreign factors or domestic left-wing extremists. Interior Minister Alexander Dobrint said foreign powers could also use extremist groups as fronts for sabotage operations.
Closely watched elections are taking place in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt on Sunday, where the far-right and pro-Russia Alternative for Germany (AfD) holds a convincing lead in the polls.
At a meeting with Wadeful in Weimar, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said that Warsaw had summoned the Russian ambassador to express "strong condemnation of Russian state terrorism."
German investigators are also continuing to follow leads in Poland and Serbia in connection with the drone attack in Leipzig, Der Spiegel magazine reported today, citing security sources.
One suspect is linked to another act of sabotage at a building materials store in Lodz, Poland, in July 2024, Der Spiegel reported.
Investigators are also looking into links between the Leipzig attack and the discovery of a drone and explosives on the Serbian-Hungarian border, Der Spiegel reported.
The Federal Criminal Police Office did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. The court in Subotica said proceedings against the two suspects were ongoing.
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