Russia to close German cultural centers amid deepening tensions with Europe over supporting Ukraine

WARSAW, Poland (AP):- Russia will close German cultural centers on its territory, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Thursday in a retaliatory measure reflecting the deepening tensions between Moscow and European countries that are helping Ukraine resist the Kremlin’s 4 1/2-year-old invasion.

Lavrov’s announcement came after Berlin blamed Moscow for an attempted drone attack at Leipzig/Halle Airport on Aug. 4. The explosives-laden drone was found near a Ukrainian plane at the airport, a major international freight hub used for providing support to Ukraine. The drone was later defused.

Earlier Thursday in Munich, several incendiary devices were thrown at a construction site near a building where several companies, including from the defense sector, are located, the Bavarian State Criminal Police Office said. There was a brief fire that caused no significant damage, police said, adding they suspect the target was one of the companies in the area.

Two Bulgarian nationals were arrested, police said, but their suspected involvement was not confirmed.

Western officials have repeatedly accused Moscow of conducting a campaign of sabotage and disruption in their countries with the aim of undermining support for Ukraine and destabilizing European nations, something Russia denies.

Germany says it has become a “daily target” of the Kremlin’s hybrid campaign.

It said Wednesday it was closing both the Russian Consulate in Bonn and the Russian House cultural center in the German capital.

Lavrov countered that cultural centers belonging to Germany’s Goethe-Institut would be closed in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg, adding that any other response would show a lack of “self-respect” on Russia’s part.

He told an economic forum in the Far East city of Vladivostok that Germany “could not have failed to understand” that closing the center in Berlin would “signify the end of their cultural presence in Russia.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Berlin wants to distract from its own failings and dissatisfaction among voters. Any proof being offered “has been planted,” Putin said.

Europe increasingly views itself as facing what it calls hybrid attacks by Russia, marked by cyberwarfare and disinformation as well as a conventional military threat. Each side accuses the other of state terrorism.

The tension has continued for months and grown into a major foreign and defense policy challenge for countries in the European Union.

Putin is testing the West with tactics that fall “just below the threshold of war” and is determined to “harass NATO members,” the head of Britain’s MI6 spy agency said last year.

European countries seek to counter Russia’s threat

Following Germany’s claims, Poland, Denmark, Finland, the U.K., the Czech Republic and Lithuania have summoned Russian diplomats stationed in their countries.

In Norway, authorities on Wednesday seized a Russian vessel in the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard at the request of Ukraine’s state-owned Naftogaz energy group.

A Norwegian court ordered the seizure as part of efforts by Naftogaz to recover a $4.22 billion arbitration award stemming from Russia’s 2014 illegal annexation of Crimea and its seizure of Ukrainian energy assets, including gas fields and pipelines. After Moscow refused to pay the 2023 award, Naftogaz petitioned national courts for orders to seize Russian commercial assets.

Putin on Thursday compared it to “state terrorism,” and Russia’s Foreign Ministry summoned Norway’s ambassador to Moscow, Heidi Olufsen, to protest the seizure of the vessel, which it said belongs to the state weather and environmental monitoring agency.

It carried workers, scientists and cargo to Russian settlements on one of the islands in Svalbard, the ministry said, adding that Moscow “will seek to lift the vessel’s arrest.”

In Finland, meanwhile, more than 2,000 people took part Thursday in the biggest civil defense exercise in Europe since the end of World War II. Among the threats envisioned were missile strikes from neighboring Russia.

EU weighs how to respond further

EU ministers on Wednesday weighed how best to respond to the attempted drone attack but struggled to find new ways to meet the challenge without resorting to military means.

The EU has slapped almost two dozen packages of sanctions on Russia over the war, targeting over 3,000 officials, oligarchs and entities including banks, energy companies and drone makers.

One senior EU official said the bloc’s anti-terrorism procedures could be put to effective use.

“If we list individuals as terrorists, we can deploy a range of instruments to actually target those individuals and to track them, all their activities and people associated with those individuals,” EU Counter-Terrorism Coordinator Bartjan Wegter said.

He told The Associated Press that EU methods for combating terrorist financing and money laundering, as well as boosting the resilience of infrastructure like airports, could be put to good use.

“It is a very worrying development,” Wegter said of the failed Leipzig drone attack. But he noted that “it is not new what we’re seeing.”

Both Russia and Iran have used hybrid warfare methods before, he said.

“They’re actually deploying terrorist tactics” that are meant to “destabilize our society,” Wegter added.

Denmark sounds alarm about Russian sabotage plans

Danish security services are warning that Russian acts of sabotage against the country’s defense industry may be imminent.

Intelligence services have seen signs of specific planning by Russia to conduct sabotage operations in Denmark, Emil Græsholm, head of counterintelligence at the national security and intelligence service PET, told the Berlingske newspaper.

The targets are primarily companies in the defense industry and especially those associated with delivering military components to Ukraine, he said.

Russian Ambassador Vladimir Barbin said PET has not presented any concrete evidence that Moscow was preparing sabotage acts in Denmark. He said Græsholm’s comments were actually an acknowledgement of Denmark’s involvement in Ukraine.

The transformation of Danish territory into a production and logistics base for the Ukrainian military posed a security risk to Denmark, he added.

Italy’s Defense Minister Guido Crosetto told AP on Wednesday that the German airport incident was “a very serious act that could have very grave consequences.”

But he said the threats aren’t discouraging Italy from further helping Kyiv as Rome weighs whether to send SAMP/T air defense batteries. As in other Western countries, limited weapons production capacity is hampering efforts to supply more to Ukraine, he said.