Ukraine’s SBU security service said Monday it detained several people, including a teenager, for acting as “informants” for Moscow, guiding Russia on its strikes on the country.
The arrests came as Russia pummeled Ukraine with strikes for three days, with 13 people killed over the weekend, as Moscow’s more than three-year invasion drags on.
The SBU said it uncovered a network of five young “agents” spying for Russia in several regions.
“The youngest of them is 16-years-old, and the oldest is 23,” the SBU said.
Both Ukraine and Russia have accused each other of recruiting young people — including underage teens — for sabotage.
“The investigation established that the group of agents included a student from Zaporizhzhia, his local acquaintance and her cohabitant,” the SBU said, adding that “two brothers” from the eastern city of Kharkiv also worked with them.
“After being recruited remotely, the agents were tasked with preparing coordinates for strikes on Ukrainian defense facilities,” it said.
The secret service added that the suspects, who are facing life in prison on treason charges, had “travelled around cities, parking cars with video recorders turned on near potential targets.”
The SBU later said it detained another “informant” — a 57-year-old man in the Mykolaiv region, accusing him of helping Russia to coordinate strikes on the southern Ukraine.
The officers said his task was to “find and transmit the coordinates of checkpoints and other locations where troops were concentrated.”
Russia has increased attacks on Ukraine in recent days, with US President Donald Trump saying — in rare criticism — that Russia’s Vladimir Putin had gone “crazy.”
Kyiv has detained an unknown number of people under collaboration laws.
