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Stuttgart Court Opens Trial of Three Accused in Russian-Directed Parcel Sabotage Plot

Prosecutors allege the men scouted a Ukrainian parcel service with GPS test shipments as part of a sabotage scheme.

Overview

  • The state-security case began at the Higher Regional Court in Stuttgart with the indictment read and hearings set through September.
  • Federal prosecutors charge the Ukrainian defendants with acting as agents and conspiring to commit arson by mailing incendiary packages.
  • Investigators say two test parcels with activated GPS trackers were sent via Nova Post in March 2025 to map transport routes before planned incendiary mailings that would ignite in transit.
  • The men were arrested in May 2025 in Cologne, Konstanz and Switzerland, one was extradited in December, and all remain in pretrial detention as the proceedings resume Thursday.
  • Defense counsel contests that the accused knew of sabotage plans, while reporting by BR and SWR cites intermediaries in Mariupol and a broader pattern of low-level recruited operatives, with Romania having reported a similar foiled plot in 2025.