Poland Charges Six Over Alleged Ammunition Component Shipments to Russia, Four With Espionage

Poland's Internal Security Agency (ABW) has detained six people suspected of supplying Russia's military with ammunition components, and four of them are charged with spying for Moscow. Tomasz Siemoniak, the coordinator of Poland's special services, announced the arrests on X on Thursday, Nov. 5.

The six are five Polish citizens aged 25 to 52 and a 37-year-old Russian national. Their names have not been released.

What prosecutors allege

According to the investigation, the group operated from June 2023 to December 2025. Its activity ran across Poland, Lithuania and Russia.

Members ordered and bought the goods, including through online stores, arranged collection and trucked them across the border into Russia's Kaliningrad Oblast. They allegedly used vehicles fitted with hidden compartments and made numerous crossings.

Polish border authorities intercepted some of the shipments. The items were ammunition components, including shell casings and projectiles.

Prosecutors put the value of the components bought and moved to Russia at more than 2 million Polish zlotys, about €455,430. The ABW said the group is believed to have supplied "significant quantities of components for military use, employed in particular in the production of ammunition and weapons systems."

The charges

All six are charged with taking part in an organized criminal group. The charges also include violating rules on international trade in goods and technologies of strategic importance for national defence and security. Prosecutors say the weapons components were exported without the required permits.

Four suspects, including the Russian national, face espionage charges and were placed in pre-trial detention for three months. The other two were given precautionary measures that do not involve jail.

These are charges, not convictions. The suspects have not been identified publicly, and no statement from them or their lawyers has been released.

The operation

The arrests came out of an operation run between Oct. 21 and Nov. 2. Polish security services searched 21 locations across the Warmian-Masurian, Pomeranian and Greater Poland voivodeships, Siemoniak said.

Officers from the ABW office in Olsztyn are leading the case. It is supervised by the Podlaskie Branch of the National Prosecutor's Office in Białystok. Siemoniak said the investigation continues.

A steady caseload

Siemoniak said nearly 100 people have been named as suspects in espionage and sabotage investigations in Poland since 2024.

Poland, an EU and NATO member on the alliance's eastern flank, has repeatedly accused Russia of sabotage since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Its territory is the main transit route for Western military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine.

On Tuesday, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Poland had foiled a possible provocation overnight at the border with Kaliningrad. Officials have not tied that incident to this case.

What comes next

The four detained suspects will stay in custody for three months while the ABW and prosecutors continue the investigation. The ABW is conducting further investigation to establish the full extent of the group's activities. Authorities have not said whether more arrests are expected or whether the intercepted shipments account for a large share of the total value. Nor have they said who in Russia received the components.