Russian online network orchestrated arsons targeting Starmer's family

Investigations by FT and BBC point to a Telegram-based recruiter with Kremlin-linked connections. Court evidence shows UK-based operatives carried out arsons after online instructions.

As reported by the online media Ukrinform .

A string of arsons targeting property belonging to Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer points to the involvement of a Russian covert online network.

Material from the Financial Times and the BBC provides confirmation of this version, notably from investigations that cover the case and its links to Russia.

On June 15, the 22-year-old Ukrainian citizen Roman Lavrinovich was found guilty in the case of damaging Starmer’s property. Prosecutors in this case did not disclose information the curator Lavrinovich’s identity, except that he used the nickname El Money on Telegram and spoke Russian and Ukrainian.

FT’s investigation, based on Telegram archives, cryptocurrency wallets, court evidence, and interviews with Western officials, established that El Money was in Russia and was closely connected to NoName057(16) – a pro-Kremlin hacker group that the United States described as a “state- project”.

NoName and other Russian “patriotic” cyber groups tried to recruit operators online to advance the Kremlin’s geopolitical interests, and to foment unrest across Europe by spreading ultra-right and anti-immigrant rhetoric.

The same curator who organized the arsons also recruited people in Britain to spray anti-Islam graffiti on mosques and other sites across London. This, FT writes, demonstrates the scale of how Russia-linked actors tried to heighten social tensions in Britain.

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said that NoName and related hacker groups were created as a “secret project,” funded by the Kremlin. According to CISA, among the NoName network participants are “people who support Moscow’s policy but have no direct ties to the government,” while others “apparently are connected to the Russian state through direct or indirect support.”

According to evidence obtained by the British police from Lavrinovich’s phone, initially El Money paid him to print posters advertising a group named Direct Action (“Direct Action”) and to post them at night across London. At first glance, Direct Action appeared to be an English-language far-right organization calling Britons to attack mosques and police vehicles. On one of its Telegram channels, there were instructions on making bombs and carrying out knife attacks. On the social network X, the group offered money to those who would “burn the police” as a form of protest against Starmer’s government.

The group intensified after Britain’s 2024 summer unrest, sparked by false claims that the knife-wielding attacker at a children’s dance class was Muslim or an asylum seeker.

In reality, Direct Action was run by people from Russia who used VPNs to hide their location and identity, and who produced ultra-right videos and other content using artificial intelligence. From time to time they made mistakes, occasionally inserting Cyrillic characters into English-language posts and publishing content with a Russian time zone.

Photos taken by Lavrinovich and sent to his Russian-speaking curator as evidence of Direct Action posters in London were later published by administrators of the group’s Telegram channel. This is evidenced by messages collected by Tell Mama, a British organization that counters Islamophobia.

Ultimately, El Money ordered Lavrinovich to set fire to a Toyota RAV4, which had previously belonged to Starmer, as well as the prime minister’s family and a residence where he had previously lived. No one was harmed as a result.

If the arsons were to make national headlines, El Money promised Lavrinovich several thousand dollars in USDT cryptocurrency. Lavrinovich stated that the curator did not tell him that the car and the two houses targeted were linked to Starmer. During police interrogations after his arrest, Lavrinovich expressed anti-Russian views, calling Vladimir Putin, the head of the Russian Federation, a terrorist.

On May 11, 2025, Lavrinovich set fire to an apartment in Islington where Keir Starmer had lived in the 1990s. The attack occurred shortly after midnight on May 12 – he set fire to the Starmer family in Kentish Town, where at that time the prime minister’s daughter-in-law was living. Starmer himself, after becoming prime minister, moved to Downing Street.

In a court in Old Bailey, Lavrinovich said he wanted to earn money because his father in Ukraine needed treatment, and that he felt pressure and threats from El Money and feared for his family’s safety.

During the trial, London’s police said they could not determine whether Lavrinovich had been paid for any of the tasks he carried out for El Money. Lavrinovich himself stated that he was paid for work (for example, posters), but that he did not receive anything for the arsons.

The identity of El Money remained unknown, but the FT found that Direct Action had close ties to Telegram channels affiliated with NoName.

Meanwhile, the BBC reports that there is evidence that Lavrinovich’s curator was 23-year-old Russian diplomat Yevgeny Lukshin, the son of a senior Russian official. Lukshin underwent training in information operations under the guidance of intelligence officers and propaganda structures, and has ties to the upper echelons of power in Moscow.

According to FT and police, on June 15, the 22-year-old Ukrainian Roman Lavrinovich and the 27-year-old Romanian Stanislav Karpyuk, who resided in London, were found guilty in the case of damaging property linked to the British Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

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