The head of the British Security Service assures that Russian officials have been operating in recent years as "private intelligence agents". The director of the British MI5, Ken McCallum, has warned that Russia is encouraging "sustained violence on the streets of Europe" and instigating "arson,

Russian spies are “on a sustained mission to generate mayhem in British streets”, the head of MI5 has said. Ken McCallum said that as the war in Ukraine continues, the security services were seeing “Putin’s henchmen seeking to strike elsewhere in the misguided hope of weakening Western resolve”.