A Polish citizen is facing charges of allegedly spying for the Russian government and potentially plotting an assassination on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The suspect, identified as Pawel K., has been charged with readiness to act for foreign intelligence against Poland, according to the Polish National Prosecutor’s Office. Pawel K. is accused of providing Russia’s foreign military intelligence agency with information on the security of the Rzeszów-Jasionka Airport in southeastern Poland, not far from the border with Ukraine.
The investigation was conducted in conjunction with Ukrainian law enforcement agencies.
“According to the investigation, the suspect, a Polish citizen, proactively established contact with the Russian military command representatives and informed them of his readiness to cooperate with the GRU,” Ukrainian Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin wrote in an X post. His tasks included collecting and transmitting information about the security of Rzeszów-Jasionka Airport to [Russia]. This was to help Russian special services plan a possible assassination attempt on the Ukrainian President during his presence in Poland,” the statement continued.
The suspect was apprehended on Wednesday after the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine shared information with Polish officials. Ukraine then obtained “key evidence” during the investigation, according to a report from the Washington Examiner.
If convicted, the suspect could face up to eight years in prison.
Wednesday’s incident was not the first time Zelensky has faced an assassination attempt since the war in Ukraine began in February 2022. Zelensky’s presidential adviser, Mikhail Podolyak, has claimed that the Ukrainian leader had survived more than a dozen attempts in the first two weeks of the war alone.