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lite.cnn.com - on gopher - inofficial | |
ARTICLE VIEW: | |
2024 parcel blasts in Europe organized by Russians with intelligence | |
ties, Lithuania says | |
By Reuters | |
Updated: | |
3:02 PM EDT, Wed September 17, 2025 | |
Source: Reuters | |
Detonations of parcels carried by DHL and DPD were organized and | |
supervised by citizens with ties to Russian military intelligence, | |
Lithuania’s general prosecution service and criminal police said on | |
Wednesday. | |
Security officials in Lithuania said last year the four parcels were | |
part of a test run for a Russian plot to trigger explosions on cargo | |
flights to the United States. | |
A joint statement by the two Lithuanian services said the parcels had | |
contained explosive devices that were set off by electronic timers | |
hidden in vibrating massage pillows. | |
It identified citizen Daniil Gromov, whose Russian documents were | |
issued under the name of Jaroslav Mikhailov, and Lithuanian-Russian | |
citizen Tomas Dovgan Stabacinskas as coordinators of the scheme. | |
The same two men organized a fire at an IKEA store in Vilnius in 2024, | |
it said. | |
“It was determined that the aforementioned individuals acted in an | |
organized manner, adhering to a very strict conspiracy, dividing | |
individual tasks,” the statement read. | |
There was no immediate response from Russia to the statement. Last | |
year, Russia denied orchestrating the IKEA fire and regularly dismisses | |
Western accusations of malign activity as | |
Governments and intelligence agencies in Europe have previously pointed | |
to Moscow as the likely source of a series of fires and acts of | |
sabotage aimed at destabilizing allies of Ukraine. | |
The Lithuanian statement said six kilograms of explosives had been | |
found during its investigation and that 15 people had been charged, | |
including citizens of Russia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Ukraine. | |
International search warrants were issued for three men – Gromov, | |
Stabacinskas and Russian citizen Andrej Baburov. | |
The statement said four parcels with “self-made, explosive-incendiary | |
charges” had been mailed from Vilnius on July 19, 2024. | |
One of them, sent with DHL, caught fire at Leipzig airport in eastern | |
Germany the next day, shortly before it was due to be loaded onto a DHL | |
plane bound for Britain. | |
A second parcel exploded on July 21 on a DPD truck as it was crossing | |
Poland, while the third detonated in a DHL warehouse in Birmingham, | |
England, on July 22. The fourth parcel, which was also being | |
transported on a DPD truck in Poland, failed to ignite due to a | |
malfunction. | |
The organizers and paid them in cryptocurrency, the statement said. | |
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