Poland’s ABW arrests a Belarusian and a Pole suspected of filming diaspora events for the Lukashenko regime
The Internal Security Agency nabbed a 19-year-old Belarusian and a 44-year-old Polish citizen in Warsaw on June 25, accusing them of paid surveillance of Belarusian minority gatherings for the Minsk regime.
The arrests
On 25 June 2026, officers of the Internal Security Agency (ABW) detained two men in Warsaw suspected of carrying out paid assignments for a foreign intelligence service. The suspects are Aliaksei B., a 19-year-old citizen of Belarus, and Rafał G., a 44-year-old Polish citizen. The operation was conducted by the ABW’s Rzeszów branch on the order of a prosecutor from the Lublin department of the National Prosecutor’s Office.
The men, paid by Belarusian intelligence, took part in events organised in Warsaw by the Belarusian minority, where they filmed participants and took photos of them.
What the spies were doing
According to the ABW, the two collected photographic documentation and video footage at legal gatherings of Belarusian émigrés, then passed the material across Poland’s eastern border. The files were subsequently used in the propaganda operations of the regime of Alexander Lukashenko. Investigators say the suspects acted for pay, payments were made via a cryptocurrency wallet, and their activity was directed and supervised by Belarusian services.
The materials were then used in the propaganda activities of the Belarusian regime.
The ABW stressed that the operation’s aim went beyond mere information gathering: it was also designed to exert pressure on exile communities, intimidate them, and reinforce aggressive narratives hostile to Poland.
A wider investigation
Today’s detentions are a continuation of a long‑running counter‑intelligence investigation supervised by the Lublin Branch of the Department for Organised Crime and Corruption of the National Prosecutor’s Office. In November 2025, five people were arrested in the same case, three Belarusian citizens and two Ukrainians, on charges of participating in the activities of a foreign intelligence service. Those earlier suspects were accused of photographing critical infrastructure, putting up posters, painting graffiti, and sending the documentation abroad via the Telegram messenger.
- Five people (three Belarusians, two Ukrainians) arrested on charges of spying and sabotage for a foreign intelligence service.
- Aliaksei B. and Rafał G. arrested in Warsaw for filming Belarusian diaspora events for the Lukashenko regime.
Preventive measures
The Lublin‑Zachód District Court reviewed the evidence gathered by the ABW’s Rzeszów division and ordered Aliaksei B. to be held in pre‑trial detention for three months. For Rafał G., the prosecutor applied non‑custodial measures: a ban on leaving Poland combined with the confiscation of his passport, and police supervision. The investigation remains open, and the services do not rule out further arrests.
This is another chapter of a case that shows how foreign services try to exploit even legal social and civic events for their own purposes.
