By Aude Dejaifve, July 22, 2022
Activists in Russia are trying to sabotage railways to prevent trains from taking military equipment to Ukraine. They have been posting pictures of damaged rails on Telegram, as well as instructions on how to carry out such sabotage acts. The Observers team spoke to a member of an anarchist organisation that has claimed responsibility for sabotage operations.
On June 28 2022, a Russian anarchist group published six photos and a video of broken train tracks on their Telegram channel. They wrote the acronym ‘BOAK’ (Organisation of Anarchy-Communist Struggle) on one of the rail tracks. According to them, the operation was carried out on a railway line leading to a military base 90 kilometres north-east of Moscow. An electric wire was attached to the rail tracks to prevent the electric signal from being cut and the train from perceiving disturbances on the track. In the end, “the track disturbance was detected, but the train traffic was delayed anyway,” our Observer told us.
A few months after the invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022, anti-war activists began sharing images of rail sabotage on Telegram channels. In their messages, they encourage people against the war to follow their example. The aim is to disrupt the passage of trains carrying Russian military equipment to Ukraine.
