Czech Prime Minister accuses russia of arson of Prague car fleet

The arson of a bus depot in Prague was another evidence of the "hybrid" sabotage campaign that Russia is waging on the territory of European countries, Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said. Western intelligence agencies believe that the scattered but increasingly numerous acts of sabotage are part of Moscow's systemic attempt to destabilize the situation in the countries supporting Ukraine.

Police on Saturday detained a Spanish-speaking man from South America who spent only five days in the Czech Republic, the BBC reported. In the early hours of Thursday morning, he poured gasoline on several buses in a Prague car park and tried to set them on fire. The damage caused was small, but Fiala in a statement linked the incident to recent fires at an Ikea store in Vilnius and Poland's largest shopping mall in Warsaw.

"A connection with russia is not only possible, but also very likely. This attack was probably organized and financed by russia."

Carrying out sabotage by proxy is a characteristic feature in the work of russian intelligence.

- In March, five people recruited by them, including 20-year-old Briton Dylan Earle, tried to set fire to a Ukrainian warehouse in London.

- Last year, a Bulgarian spy group working for russia, which was monitoring local military facilities, was uncovered in the UK.

- In Germany, two men with German and Russian citizenship were arrested this spring. They monitored military factories, arms delivery routes and the US base where Ukrainian tankers are trained, and also planned sabotage at military and industrial facilities.

- In 2023-2024, several groups of spies and potential saboteurs were arrested in Poland, including recruited Ukrainians and Belarusians who were trying to quickly earn money by performing seemingly simple tasks.

"For russia, this is normal behavior... They hired 10 people to attack [in February] the cars of the Minister of Internal Affairs and a journalist," Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur recently said. "We need to understand that russia is acting more and more aggressively towards the countries of Europe and NATO."

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