Ukraine’s intelligence service says it thwarted a Russian plot to blackmail a local teenage girl into blowing up a police building by threatening to make public intimate pictures on her phone.
The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and National Police detained the 14-year-old in the western Ukrainian city of Ternopil before the improvised explosive device could be detonated, the SBU said on the Telegram app on Friday.
The agency said the teen’s Russian handlers had planned to detonate the homemade bomb, killing the girl and passersby.
Investigators said she had come to the Russian security service’s attention when looking for money-making opportunities on Telegram.
They said hackers had gained remote access to her phone and retrieved compromising photos. “They then blackmailed her, threatening to leak explicit photos of the minor online,” the SBU said.
Having coerced the teenager into cooperating, they then instructed her on how to make an explosive device.
“The occupiers had recruited her to carry out a suicide bombing near the local district police department,” said the SBU.
The SBU warned the Ukrainian public that recruiting and then killing collaborators is now a favored Russian tactic.
In early March, two teenage boys recruited through Telegram were blown up by their Russian handlers. One was killed instantly and the other critically injured. Other minors were also implicated in the terror plot in the western city of Ivano-Frankivsk, the SBU said.
The teenage girl detained in Ternopil faces terrorism charges carrying a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.
