A Sofia court has issued a European arrest warrant for two 19-year-old German citizens accused of setting fire to eight Starlink antennas near Sofia. According to the indictment, the two set fire to the facilities late on the evening of October 9 in a mountainous area south of the Bulgarian capital.
The fire completely destroyed three of the 18 antennas on the site. Another five were partially or seriously damaged, according to documents presented during the court hearing. If convicted of arson in a particularly serious case, the defendants could receive between three and 12 years in prison.
The two left Bulgaria that same evening
According to the investigation, the two Germans entered Bulgaria from Serbia in a Volkswagen car with German license plates. They were presented as tourists and left the country that same evening along the same route.
The men were charged in absentia on October 14. Two days later, a national arrest warrant was issued against them, and then the court issued a European warrant. The two are not detained in Bulgaria.
The appointed defense attorneys stated that the video recordings do not allow for a clear identification of the perpetrators. According to the prosecutor's office, they were wearing masks and gloves. The court has accepted that the available witness statements and material evidence are sufficient to continue the criminal prosecution at this stage of the investigation.
DANS defines the case as sabotage
Before the parliament, the chairman of DANS Plamen Tonchev defined the fire near Sofia as sabotage. “Similar acts of sabotage cannot be ruled out in the future“, he warned.
The case in Bulgaria comes against the backdrop of other attacks on Starlink infrastructure in Europe. Over the weekend, Lithuanian authorities registered an attempted attack on an equipment supplier for the American communications system. In September, a Starlink facility in Poland was set on fire in what Warsaw described as targeted sabotage. The Polish government suspects Russian special services of the attack.
Starlink is a satellite communications network of Elon Musk's SpaceX company. It is important for the communications of the Ukrainian armed forces, and according to Kiev, it is also used for drone control and counter-drone operations.
Sources: zdfheute.de