A 20-year-old British man has been charged with masterminding an arson plot against a Ukrainian-linked target in London for the benefit of the Russian state, prosecutors said on Friday.
\n\u201cIncluded in the alleged activity was involvement in the planning of an arson attack on a Ukrainian-linked commercial property in March 2024,\u201d the Crown Prosecution Service said in a statement.
\nCourt documents allege that suspect Dylan Earl, from Leicestershire in central England, was connected to the proscribed terrorist group the Wagner Group, the domestic Press Association news agency reported.
\nHe is accused of organizing and paying for an arson attack on two units on an industrial estate in Leyton, east London, on March 20, which required 60 firefighters to bring under control.
\nThe alleged target is referred to as \u201cMr X\u201d in the charges.
\nThe CPS, which brings prosecutions in England and Wales, said two other men \u2014 Paul English, 60, and Nii Mensah, 21 \u2014 had also been charged with aggravated arson in connection with the case.
\nA third, Jake Reeves, 22, had been charged with agreeing to accept a material benefit from a foreign intelligence service as well as aggravated arson.
\nA fifth man, Dmitrijus Paulauska, 22, has been charged with having information about terrorist acts, the CPS added.
\nUK Foreign Secretary David Cameron said: \u201cWhile we must let the judicial process run its course, I am deeply concerned by allegations of British nationals carrying out criminal activity on UK soil to benefit the Russian state.
\n\u201cWe will use the full weight of the criminal justice system to hold anyone found guilty of crimes linked to foreign interference to account,\u201d he wrote on the social media platform X.
\nDominic Murphy, head of the Metropolitan Police in London\u2019s Counter Terrorism Command which is leading the investigation, said: \u201cThis is a highly significant moment and investigation for us.
\n\u201cNot only are the charges that have been authorized by the CPS extremely serious, but it is also the first time that we have arrested, and now charged anyone using the powers and legislation brought in under the National Security Act.\u201d
\nThe National Security Act 2023 came into effect in December last year, and was designed to respond to \u201cthe threat of hostile activity from states targeting the UK\u2019s democracy, economy, and values,\u201d the government said at the time.
\nAll five suspects are due to appear at the Central Criminal Court at the Old Bailey, London, on May 10.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A 20-year-old British man has been charged with masterminding an arson plot against a Ukrainian-linked target in London for the benefit of the Russian state, prosecutors said on Friday. \u201cIncluded in the alleged activity was involvement in the planning of an arson attack on a Ukrainian-linked commercial property in March 2024,\u201d the Crown Prosecution Service …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":63923,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-63907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63907"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63907\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":63930,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63907\/revisions\/63930"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}