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Move reflects heightened concern that Russia may be plotting violent acts across Europe

German police temporarily sealed off an air base near Cologne as they investigated a suspected case of sabotage, authorities have said, with media reports indicating its water supply had been contaminated.

The operation at the military facility, an important hub for western allies’ military support of Ukraine, comes at a time of heightened concern in European capitals that Russia could be plotting violent acts across the continent as it commits to a course of permanent conflict with the west.

Intelligence agencies believe Russia has already begun to prepare covert bombings, arson attacks and damage to infrastructure in Europe, either directly or through proxies.

Col Arne Collatz, a spokesperson for the defence ministry, said an intruder was suspected of illegally entering the Cologne-Wahn barracks and carrying out an act of sabotage. He said investigators as well as officials of the State Protection Office, a police unit that deals with politically motivated crimes, were at the air base, which was set to reopen later on Wednesday.

“You can assume that the safety of barracks has absolute priority at the moment and everyone is very alert to possible gaps [in security] that might arise,” Collatz said. 

Authorities also said there had been another incident at a Nato air base in Geilenkirchen, close to Germany’s border with the Netherlands, and said they could not exclude a link with the suspected sabotage in Cologne-Wahn. The security level was raised at the facility, but it was not sealed off, Nato said.

The news magazine Spiegel reported that the saboteur at Cologne-Wahn may have contaminated the barracks’ water supply. It cited internal communications in which soldiers and civilian employees were warned not to drink any tap water. Collatz declined to comment. The air base has its own waterworks.

A statement by the Bundeswehr’s territorial leadership command said it “wishes all members of the armed forces who had come to harm during the incident a speedy and complete recovery”. The Bundeswehr did not say how many people had been affected or provide other details about the incident.

Spiegel said the military air base to the south-east of Cologne, the biggest city in the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia, provides military support for Kyiv, while Ukrainian soldiers who undergo training in Germany return home from the facility.

It also hosts several military and civilian departments of the Bundeswehr as well as the headquarters of the department that provides military planes to German cabinet ministers for official trips. The facility is adjacent to Cologne’s commercial airport.

Spiegel said Bundeswehr officers inspecting the site on Wednesday morning found a hole in a section of fence surrounding the barracks.

Thomas Haldenwang, head of German domestic intelligence, said in April that the “risk of state-controlled acts of sabotage [had] significantly increased” in recent months. He said Russia now seemed comfortable carrying out operations on European soil “[with] a high potential for damage”.

He was speaking just days after two German-Russian nationals were arrested in Bayreuth, Bavaria, for allegedly plotting to attack military and logistics sites in Germany on behalf of Russia.

Meanwhile, two men were charged in the UK in late April with having started a fire at a warehouse containing aid shipments for Ukraine. English prosecutors have accused them of working for the Russian government.

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