"Poland is continuously attacked in hybrid form"

2023-09-03 09:57:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

"Poland is continuously attacked in hybrid form"

Warsaw

The quality was poor, but the signal was audible. "For the victory", was the call of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin. "Hooray" the soldiers reply. Then the Russian anthem was played. Locomotive drivers near Szczecin, Poland heard this signal in late August, after another command came an emergency stop. More than 20 trains stopped running.

Freight train traffic in the region was temporarily suspended. The Polish Intelligence Service, ABW, is investigating, said Stanislaw Zaryn, the Polish prime minister's state secretary. "At the moment we are not ruling out any scenario," Zaryn said. But it should be "also emphasized", that the life and health of the passengers were not in danger. "This incident must be clarified, also because of the current danger to the Polish state."

"Poland is continuously attacked in hybrid form"

Transit place for the transport of weapons

The threat to the Polish railway came from a simple shortwave transmitter. Not a technically perfect work, the experts concluded. But the Russian anthem makes everyone think of an act of sabotage. A little later, two people who must have sent the emergency stop signal were arrested - one of the suspects, a Polish policeman.

Poland as a transit country for the transport of weapons for Ukraine seems to be the focus of the Russian secret services. As early as March of this year, the authorities discovered an espionage group. And new members of the group are regularly arrested. At the end of August, a total of 16 were arrested for espionage. The prosecution accuses them of "carrying out espionage for Russia and being members of a criminal group," said Mariusz Kaminski, the Polish interior minister, after the first arrests. Internal intelligence officers "had found cameras, electronic devices and GPS transmitters to be fixed on aid shipments to Ukraine."

"Poland is continuously attacked in hybrid form"

One is arrested, another is recruited

The suspects are foreigners, the Polish Minister of the Interior, Kaminski, did not say more. Meanwhile, Polish media reports that part of the group consists of Ukrainian refugees. They are not educated agents but recruits who perform these services for money. If one is arrested, another is recruited somewhere, as Poland is constantly being hybridly fought, said Zbginiew Hoffmann, state secretary for national defence. "This of course comes from the Kremlin, but it is also practiced by Belarus," according to Hoffmann, and affects several sectors. "There is not only direct danger from Wagner troops" but also cyber attacks. Whoever deals with this knows "that they do not use this strategy from yesterday or today."

Hoffmann talks about the expertise of the post-Soviet secret services. The strategy is destabilization and chaos. And it leaves a mark. When in Rshezcov, an important transit point to Ukraine, Legionella bacteria were found in the drinking water, resulting in the death of 18 people (current situation), the Polish secret service was immediately involved in the investigation. Perhaps the infection was the result of problems with the water pipes, but an assassination cannot be ruled out either. The uncertainty in Poland is great./ DW