A DHL cargo plane crashed on approach to an airport in Lithuania's capital and skidded into a house Monday morning, killing a Spanish crew member but not harming anyone on the ground, per the AP. The cause is under investigation. A surveillance video showed the plane descending normally as it approached the airport before sunrise, and then exploding into a huge ball of fire behind a building. The moment of impact could not be seen in the video.
Lithuanian officials acknowledged that one line of inquiry will be whether Russia played a role given its suspected involvement in other cases of sabotage—although they stressed that there is no evidence pointing to that yet. "Without a doubt, we cannot rule out the terrorism version," said Darius Jauniskis, chief of Lithuanian intelligence. Western security officials suspect that Russian intelligence is carrying out sabotage in retaliation for nations' support for Ukraine—including arson attacks and disinformation, and by putting incendiary devices in packages on cargo planes. In July, one caught fire at a courier hub in Germany and another ignited in a warehouse in England.
Polish prosecutors said last month that parcels with camouflaged explosives were sent via cargo companies to EU countries and Britain to "test the transfer channel for such parcels" that were ultimately destined for the US and Canada. "We see Russia becoming more aggressive," Jauniskis said. "But for now, we really cannot make any attributions or point fingers at anyone, because there is no information about it." The Lithuanian airport authority identified the aircraft as a DHL cargo plane arriving from Leipzig, Germany, a major freight hub, and one of the injured was a German citizen.
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