Over the past three days, Russia has recorded a number of attempted arson attacks targeting ATMs, shopping centers, post offices and other government buildings. TASR informs about it according to the Sunday report of the AFP agency.
Since Friday, according to Russian media, around 20 cases have been reported in which individuals tried to detonate small explosive devices or fireworks in front of various buildings, mostly in St. Petersburg or Moscow or their suburbs.
The Russian agency TASS, citing an unnamed source from the environment of law enforcement agencies, reported that the arsonists were recruited by Internet fraudsters who offered them a financial reward for such actions.
The attackers are filming the event
In some places, security cameras caught people filming their arson attempts on their mobile phones. The images are spreading on social networks. Records of the consequences of such attacks also appear there. In one case, they capture a destroyed ATM and broken windows, in another, for example, a burnt police car.
The targets of such attacks are ATMs of state banks, shopping centers, post offices, army conscription offices, police vehicles and administrative buildings.
Russian state bank Sberbank has reported that it has seen a 30 percent increase in attempted arson attacks over the past week. The TASS agency reported that they detained mostly pensioners in connection with such attacks. Sberbank claims that senior citizens were hired by fraudsters in Ukraine to commit arson.
Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) warned Russians some time ago about alleged Ukrainian fraudsters who, according to it, are posing as agents of the security services. The FSB says they are making phone calls to elderly Russians asking them to carry out arson attacks, promising them financial rewards or access to their frozen bank accounts. Kyiv has not yet commented on these accusations or the latest wave of arson attacks in Russia.
Since Russia invaded neighboring Ukraine in February 2022, it has been the target of arson attacks using home-made so-called Molotov cocktails have already been thrown at several army recruitment offices in Russia. Such attacks intensified after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a partial mobilization in September 2022, in which more than 300,000 Russians were called up to fight in Ukraine. Russian courts often severely punished arsonists, with several years in prison.
