In Lithuania, a photograph of a company executive with a black mourning ribbon was placed next to funeral wreaths, and similar objects turned up near a Czech defense company, Delfi reported on 30 August. Law enforcement officials are investigating whether the two incidents are connected.

Russia is trying to obstruct the defense assistance that NATO countries provide to Ukraine. To this end, Russia uses various forms of intimidation: exerting political pressure, carrying out cyberattacks, and recruiting people to conduct sabotage against foreign defense companies. Russia is suspected of using a new form of psychological pressure against the executives of companies that supply aid to Ukraine: through the use of elements symbolically associated with death.

Wreaths outside a Vilnius drone maker, and a suspect in custody

In Vilnius, funeral wreaths were left near the offices of RSI Europe, a company that manufactures unmanned systems and supplies Ukraine with FPV drones and remote detonation systems. Next to the wreaths, unknown individuals placed a photograph of company head Tomas Milašauskas, tied with a black mourning ribbon. Milašauskas is alive and well.

"We are not afraid. This is ordinary intimidation, a provocation, the usual methods of Russians' work. Our reaction is absolutely normal—we continue to work, we do not react and do not get distracted, because their goal is to distract our attention and direct it where it should not go," Milašauskas told LNK Žinios, as relayed by Delfi.

Milašauskas said that this was the first time RSI Europe had faced such a provocation. But the company had previously faced attempts to interfere with its operations, including cyberattacks.

A similar incident occurred in Czechia at almost the same time. Funeral wreaths also appeared near the offices of Czech defense group CSG, which makes ammunition and military equipment. A photograph of CSG executive director David Chour was placed nearby, Delfi reported.

Lithuanian police have already detained one suspect and launched a pre-trial investigation. National Crisis Management Centre head Vilmantas Vitkauskas said he believed the monitoring and the measures taken after earlier talks with defense firms made the detention possible. The detainee is a Ukrainian citizen, LNK's sources said. Preliminary information suggests that he may have been hired to deliver the wreaths, while the person who ordered them may have been a Belarusian citizen.

“This is probably only the beginning”

Lithuanian officials are treating the use of mourning symbols against defense companies as a possible provocation linked to Russian intelligence, after warning the sector to expect such attempts. Remigijus Motuzas, chairman of the Lithuanian parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee, said:

"I think that such cases may become more frequent—and they have already become more frequent. This is probably only the beginning," he said.

He said the warnings are serious enough to require particular vigilance, although security at infrastructure facilities in the country has already been strengthened.

The Lithuanian authorities are also paying particular attention to the fact that photographs and videos of the wreaths quickly spread on social media and Telegram channels following the incidents. Posts accompanying the material promoted claims that NATO is allegedly fighting Russia with Ukraine’s hands, while European companies assisting Kyiv are supposedly making money from the war. Lithuanian officials consider this information component characteristic of information operations by Russian intelligence services.

Slovak police foiled a planned arson attack on a drone factory in the country's east, the force said on 25 August. Investigators charged three foreigners with preparing the attack on commission and seized incendiary material and equipment at the scene. The plant belongs to the Ukrainian drone maker Skyeton, Militarnyi reported.

Had the attack in Slovakia gone ahead, it risked a large fire, danger to life and health, and damage on a large scale, police stated. About 70 employees could have been in the building at the time, by preliminary estimates. Property inside the production hall is worth tens of millions of euros, according to the findings so far.

Officers seized a larger quantity of incendiary mixture, along with tools, mobile phones, an action camera, and a hand-made plan. The police Criminalistics and Expertise Institute gave a preliminary finding that the substance was a mixture of gasoline and polystyrene, commonly called napalm. Slovakia's anti-crime unit ÚBOK, part of the Police Presidium, identified the people preparing the attack and stopped it. Nobody was hurt and no property was damaged, police said.

The charges, and where the three were detained

An ÚBOK investigator charged the three foreigners with preparing a particularly serious crime of general endangerment, committed as co-perpetrators on order. Officers detained two of them in Slovakia, and the investigator moved to have both taken into custody. German authorities detained the third on a European arrest warrant. The investigation continues, and the legal classification of the men's actions may still change.

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The plant, and a company Russia has already hit

Slovakia, a NATO and EU member, borders Ukraine on its eastern edge. Skyeton builds the Raybird, a fixed-wing reconnaissance drone that has served with Ukraine's Armed Forces since 2018 and stays airborne for up to 28 hours. The company began production in Slovakia in 2024, and more than €10 million in foreign investment went into the plant, one of several sites Ukrainian firms opened abroad to cut the risk of Russian attacks.

That risk is not theoretical. Russia destroyed Skyeton's Kyiv office in May, and the company said it had already spread production capacity across Ukraine and abroad in anticipation.

A Skyeton representative told Militarnyi:

"The recent attempt on our production in Slovakia is another sign that Ukrainian arms makers are already a bone in their throat, which means we are on the right path." 

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Arson against Ukraine's defense partners in Europe

Companies working for Ukraine have been hit across several countries this year and earlier. 

In March, suspects who claimed a pro-Palestinian motive set fire to the Pardubice production of Archer, a Ukrainian maker of thermal imaging sights, destroying nearly all of the company's capacity in Czechia.

Estonia opened a Russian-link investigation this month into a suspected arson at a military robot maker supplying Ukraine, and Lithuania charged six people in January over an attempt to burn a factory that supplied radio-wave scanners. 

A powerful explosion of undetermined cause hit EMCO, one of Bulgaria's largest private arms makers, which produces artillery ammunition for Ukraine, on 10 August.