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11 Deported After Russia-Funded Anti-Ukraine Protest Network Exposed in Poland
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The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and Polish law enforcement have exposed 11 people who organized a series of Kremlin-paid anti-Ukrainian rallies in Poland on Russia's orders, the SBU announced on July 2.
The agency reported the operation on its official website, describing it as a joint effort between SBU counterintelligence and Poland's Internal Security Agency.
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The case lays bare how directly Moscow steers street-level provocations inside the EU, paying crowds to stage fake protests designed to discredit Ukraine abroad and destabilize the societies hosting millions of its refugees.
According to the SBU, the group staged five pseudo-protest actions in Warsaw and Wrocław during 2025 and 2026, all of which were inspired and financed by the Kremlin. Organizers offered participants $100 to $200 for a single appearance in the crowd, the agency noted.
The international investigation identified 11 people across EU territory, the SBU stated. Among them were two Belarusian citizens and nine Ukrainian citizens living in the European Union who helped organize the events.
Every stage of the scheme ran through Moscow, the agency emphasized. Acting on instructions from Russian curators, the organizers recruited potential participants, briefed them, distributed provocative agitational materials and paid them in cash.
The SBU added that the staged "protests" pursued two Kremlin goals: discrediting Ukraine on the international stage and undermining the political stability of EU countries.
All 11 people have been deported to their countries of origin, the SBU confirmed.
The actions of the Ukrainian nationals will receive a legal assessment based on each person's degree of guilt, and international investigative work continues to bring all organizers of the pro-Kremlin provocations to justice.
The exposure comes as Warsaw itself warns that Moscow is working the same seam.
A day earlier, Poland’s Minister-Coordinator for Special Services, Tomasz Siemoniak, cautioned that Russia would try to exploit friction between Warsaw and Kyiv.
The warning came after Polish President Karol Nawrocki stripped Volodymyr Zelenskyy of the Order of the White Eagle, Poland’s highest state honor.
Zelenskyy returned the decoration to Warsaw, and three former Ukrainian presidents—Leonid Kuchma, Viktor Yushchenko, and Petro Poroshenko—renounced the same honor in solidarity, while Polish security officials reported a Russian-financed mechanism using Ukrainian refugees in Poland to erode trust in Kyiv's leadership.
Paid rallies are only one strand of Russia's coordinated activity on Polish soil.
In May, Poland’s Internal Security Agency detained three Polish citizens suspected of running a spy ring for Russian intelligence, collecting data on infrastructure and NATO force placements while producing pro-Russian propaganda.
Investigators found the cell operated under instructions from a Russian national linked to the Federal Security Service and had trained with firearms in apparent preparation for sabotage.
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