Over the 10 days from Dec. 13 to 22, Russians committed 34 arson attacks on municipal offices, multifunctional centers (MFC), banks, post offices and police cars in several Russian cities. According to reports in Russian mainstream and social media, those who were apprehended claimed they did so under pressure from telephone scammers who said they’d get their money back if they did what they were told.
The independent Russian news site Mediazona said this was the largest wave of such attacks that have occurred in Russia since the February 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It seems this campaign may have been intended to coincide with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s Dec. 19 end of year “Direct Line” propaganda exercise and the Dec. 20 Security Service Worker’s Day.
JOIN US ON TELEGRAM
Follow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official.
The first attack was carried out on Dec. 13 when 21-year-old Dmitry Baranov threw several Molotov cocktails at a military registration and enlistment office building in Yekaterinburg. During a pretrial court hearing, Baranov said he had lost 3 million rubles ($30,000) to scammers who forced him to carry out the attack.
Holiday Spirit Thrives Among Ukrainians Despite War, Study Finds
On Dec. 14, the administration building of Sberbank in Primorsky Krai was set on fire by an unknown individual. More attacks have followed every day in December so far, with the bulk on Dec. 20 and 21.
On Dec. 20, 19-year-old university student Valeria Lera doused the ATMs in a bank branch on Let Oktyabrya Street in Krasnoyarsk with gasoline and set it, and herself, on fire. She was taken to hospital with second-degree burns.
Also on Friday, several police cars were set alight in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Tver. The attacker in Moscow was caught in the act and the fire was quickly extinguished. The police car in St. Petersburg was destroyed and the teenage girl responsible was also detained. In Tver, a young man doused the car with flammable liquid and set it on fire. He apparently filmed the attack on his phone which police think he sent to scammers as proof he had done as he was told.
Mediazona said it had recorded 156 attacks since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, many of which were instigated by scammers who forced the perpetrators to do their bidding. The largest series of attacks occurred at the end of July and early August in 2023 when 37 arson attacks were carried out.
A series of attacks later in the year coincided with Putin’s announcement of a partial mobilization with 19 attacks aimed against military registration, enlistment offices and other facilities.
You can also highlight the text and press Ctrl + Enter
