Intelligence agencies warn against Russian attempts to assassinate European defense CEOs - report
The main goal is psychological, one intelligence official said, to make people think twice before doing business with Ukraine
Western intelligence agencies have warned CEOs and other senior employees at defense companies that they are being targeted by Kremlin operatives. According to officials from five European intelligence agencies who spoke with the Financial Times, Europe's defense company bosses that Russia is stepping up efforts to assassinate them, prompting companies to increase personal security around top executives.
With battlefield progress deadlocked in Ukraine and Russia's economy struggling, the Kremlin has ordered an expansion of sabotage and "hybrid" operations in Europe as it seeks to weaken support for Kyiv. Assassinations against European civilian targets, once considered taboo even by Russia's spy agencies, are becoming a prominent part of those plans, according to the intelligence services.
Executives at smaller companies, especially those making drones or components, are also being targeted. "The threat level has risen in Europe. To property but also to people," one senior European intelligence official said.
Sinan Selen, head of Germany's domestic intelligence service BfV, told German lawmakers on Monday, "Russia is engaged in the deliberate planning of acts of violence against individuals by state or state-controlled actors." Selen also stated, "We are observing a further development of these actions in terms of the targets, the methods and the actors involved, including the use of organised crime structures."
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Several defence executives, speaking anonymously, told the FT they escalated close-protection arrangements in the past six months on the advice of government security services.
"The main goal from the Russian perspective is still psychological," one intelligence official said. "Just by making people feel they might be a target, they are having their effect. They want individuals to think twice before doing business with Ukraine."
One official stressed that many Russian efforts remain amateurish and easily countered. In August, the two holidaymakers arrested in Sweden near the property of Saab CEO Micael Johansson were released shortly afterwards.