Russia will try to drag Minsk into the war in Ukraine by staging a false flag attack at an oil refinery in Belarus using saboteurs disguised as Wagner mercenaries, Kyiv has claimed.
The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said it had gathered information about the alleged plot from a number of different sources.
"Notably, one source of information is a captured member of the Russian Armed Forces, who was taken into custody by Ukrainian forces in the Zaporizhzhia region," the SBU said in a statement posted on Telegram on Friday.
The SBU claims the operation is being orchestrated by a covert intelligence group, comprised of personnel from the Russian Armed Forces and operatives of Russian special services, dispatched to Belarus under the guise of being Wagner mercenaries.
“Russia plans to accuse Ukraine of what they have done in order to try once again to draw Minsk into the full-scale war against our state,” the SBU added.
The SBU's cybersecurity experts also claimed to have recovered and analyzed data from the captured Russian's mobile phone.
Their analysis said the individual had previously participated in combat operations against Ukrainian Defense Forces in the southern region of Ukraine.
Recent instructions directed him to relocate to Belarus under the auspices of the private military company Wagner.
"As he transitioned to his new deployment, the Russian serviceman received details about a 'special mission' at the Mozyr Oil Refinery. Deleted correspondences with other operatives, photographs of the facility, and specific information pertaining to the operation were discovered on his phone by the SBU's cyber specialists," the report said.
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