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Russian military intelligence was behind a fire at an IKEA store in Vilnius last year, with at least one of the suspects linked to other sabotages in Eastern Europe, according to prosecutors in Lithuania.
Altras Urberis, the chief prosecutor of organized crime in Lithuania, said Russia was linked to IKEA arson and other cases through a series of intermediaries.
“The organizer of these actions is Russia. It is linked to military intelligence, security forces,” Ulberis said Monday.
Russia has been accused of being obstructed across Europe by numerous Western Intelligence Agency officials in recent months after numerous fires, parcel bombs and vandalism acts. Officials say Russia often pays people, including low-level criminals, to carry out attacks.
A Polish court last month sentenced Ukrainians to eight years in prison for planning acts of sabotage and arson on behalf of Russia. Polish authorities last week indicted Belarusians in arson attack on a large DIY store in Warsaw on behalf of Russia’s intelligence agency. In the UK, a man pleaded guilty to accepting a salary from a foreign intelligence news agency last year when he set fire to a Ukrainian-owned business in East London.
Kiel Giles, a senior fellow at Chatham House, described the attack on “isolated pinpricks,” but said that a hybrid war by Russia could pose serious risks.
“Removing the random noise of obviously pointless vandalism, like attacks on IKEA and shopping centres, and instead focusing on targeted reconnaissance and damage to communication and logistics infrastructure, it becomes clear how this campaign will damage them.
Aerial view of Mary Wyrska 44 shopping centre burning in a massive fire in Warsaw, Poland last May © Agencja Wyborcza/Reuters
Authorities are also investigating whether Russia is behind many greater sabotage in the Baltic Sea in the past two years when gas pipelines and electricity and data cables have been cut by ship anchors.
The Kremlin has denied the European government’s accusations of the hybrid war.
Lithuanian prosecutors treat the IKEA fire as a terrorist act, and believe the perpetrators are two Ukrainian citizens.
Lithuanian prosecutors said one suspect was arrested last May on his way to the Latvian capital, Riga, to carry out a similar arson attack. The suspect, who was short at the time of the attack, agreed to pay 10,000 euros for both the Vilnius and Riga attacks, they added.
The suspect then placed an agitator at the IKEA store on the evening of May 8th, and the timed fuse was released around 4am the next day. The suspect has already returned to Warsaw and received a BMW 530 as a reward to complete the task, prosecutors added.
The second suspect is currently in detention in Poland, and some of the investigation will be moved to Polish authorities, Urbelis said. The suspect appears to be linked to criminal acts committed in Poland, he added.
Lithuanian prosecutors said IKEA was intentionally chosen as furniture retailers closed all of Russia’s stores.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tass said the office of Lithuanian prosecutors “confirmed suspicions” that Russian security services are responsible for causing fires in shopping centres in Vilnius and Warsaw. ”It’s a good idea to know before negotiating. This is the nature of this condition,” he wrote to X.
An Estonian court last year found seven people guilty of destroying a car belonging to the country’s interior minister and journalists in orders in the Russian intelligence newsletter.
Additional Reports by Charles Clover of London
