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Investigators now suspect Russia was behind a fire at a DHL airport center in Germany that was started by a package bound for Great Britain.
They also believe that it may have been a test run for how to perform a similar attack to cause “mayhem” in the United States and Canada, the Guardian reports.
According to authorities, it was only due to a flight delay causing the late arrival of the package on a DHL airplane traveling from a Baltic country that the package ignited on the ground in Leipzig rather than in the air on the outgoing flight. Had that occurred, it would more than likely have caused the plane to crash.
The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday that the items in the packages were electric massagers implanted with a magnesium-based flammable substance. Magnesium fires are both difficult to put out and increase in intensity if water is used to try and put out the fire.
The packages, sent from Lithuania, were addressed to fake recipients at real addresses in the United Kingdom.
Lithuanian police have arrested one suspect, believed to have been used as a proxy by Russian spy services, who shipped four incendiary devices, two from a DHL store in the capital of Vilnius. Poland’s National Prosecutor’s Office said they arrested four people in connection with the incident and are still searching for at least two more suspects.
“The group’s goal was also to test the transfer channel for such parcels, which were ultimately to be sent to the United States of America and Canada,” Poland’s National Prosecutor’s Office said.
British police and officials, as well as their European counterparts in Germany, Poland and Lithuania, strongly suspect that Russia was behind the attacks as part of an effort to cause “mayhem” in the west in retaliation for western military support to Ukraine.
“I’m not sure the political leaders of Russia are aware of the consequences if one of these packages exploded, causing a mass casualty event,” said Pawel Szota, head of Poland’s foreign-intelligence agency.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied any Russian connection to the DHL packages, telling the Wall Street Journal, “These are traditional unsubstantiated insinuations from the media.”
Last month, MI5 Director General Ken McCallum warned Russia’s military intelligence agency “is on a sustained mission to generate mayhem on British and European streets: we’ve seen arson, sabotage and more.”