ADVERTISEMENT

Fourteen members of a dismantled spy network in Poland were found guilty of preparing acts of sabotage and carrying out intelligence activities for Moscow on Tuesday.

The defendants, who include Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian nationals, were indicted last month for acts including planning to derail trains carrying aid to Ukraine and monitoring military installations and critical infrastructure in Poland. They also distributed propaganda materials inciting hate against Ukrainians.

“After reviewing the case, the court found all the defendants guilty of the crimes charged and found that some of them were operating within an organised criminal group,” the Polish court’s judge, Jaroslaw Kowalski, said in his verdict.

All defendants had pleaded guilty to the charges. They were not present in court when the verdict against them was delivered. One of those condemned is Maxim S., a Russian ice hockey player who was playing in a Polish club in Sosnowiec at the time of his arrest in June. Moscow protested his arrest, asking for “full explanations” from Warsaw.

While the full identities of all defendants have not been revealed, the group has been reported to include “two Ukrainian lawyers and a political scientist, a French teacher, a pharmacy technician and a computer engineer,” as written by the Rzeczpospolita daily.

Two more alleged members of the spy network who withdrew their initial guilty pleas will be tried separately, according to a spokesperson for the court.

Investigators found that members of the network received instructors via Telegram, an encrypted, cloud-based messaging app, and were paid in cryptocurrencies. According to Polish media, they were paid between $300 and $10,000 – or €273 and €9,112.