Facebook ads for Russian passports ‘may be recruitment drive for spies’

Ads for a Russian nationality on Facebook could in fact be a recruitment campaign for Kremlin spies, officials have warned.

Posters showing a smiling young woman waving a Russian passport have been popping up on social media in Lithuania.

‘Russian passport – support at every step. Russian citizenship for Russian-speaking Lithuanians. Without the need to renounce Lithuanian citizenship. Repatriation within three to six months’ the ad reads.

It promotes Russian nationality without the need to renounce Lithuanian citizenship -even though dual citizenship is generally not permitted in the country.

These ads may also be used as a recruitment tool for the Russian secret services, Lithuanian institutions have warned.

‘Russia is seeking to identify certain individuals who may be sympathetic to or have some sentiments towards that country to possibly exploit them in the future,’ Vilmantas Vitkauskas, head of the Crisis Management Centre in Lithuania, told broadcaster LRT.

According to the centre, the ads are published by a private Russian firm, the Central Migration Agency.

It issues Russian international passports and runs a so-called repatriation programme approved by the Kremlin.

Lithuanian political analyst Gabriele Burbulyte-Tsiskarishvili said the ad is looking to ‘mislead’ citizens to renounce their nationality.

She said: ‘When accepting citizenship of another country, a citizen of Lithuania must renounce their Lithuanian citizenship (unless there are exceptional circumstances).

‘This has nothing to do with the information in the advertisement because the decision is made by the Lithuanian side; therefore, a person who has become a participant of the repatriate programme and has not renounced citizenship of Lithuania immediately violates the law and it is only a matter of time when it will happen set.’

The analyst added that the ad has been ‘circling’ on social media in Lithuania for awhile.

Officials in Vilnius have urged Lithuanians not to engage or respond to the ads and to report any suspicious activity.

The Lithuanian Foreign Ministry said in a statement it was illegal for the country’s nationals to hold multiple passports, without first securing an exemption.

The decision to take a Russian passport would also ‘expose men to the possibility of being drafted to participate in Russian aggression in Ukraine’, the ministry said.

Lithuania, which was the first Soviet republic to proclaim independence in 1990, has cut ties with Russia – not only diplomatically – since the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

It is one of the Baltic states to have disconnected their electricity systems from Russia’s power grid in February, part of a plan to integrate with the EU and boost security.

The nation is also doing everything to prepare for an invasion by Russia amid stalling talks about a ceasefire in Ukraine.

Lithuania’s government had already reinstated conscription in 2015, but in January, it committed to spending between 5% and 6% of its GDP on defence annually until at least 2030.

Metro has contacted META for a comment.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.

Trump ‘angry’ and ‘pissed off’ with Putin in change in rhetoric over Ukraine ceasefire

Donald Trump has voiced his anger towards Vladimir Putin – a major shift from the softer approach the US president has taken in ongoing talks to end the war in Ukraine.

He threatened the Kremlin with his weapon of choice – secondary tariffs of 25% to 50% on all Russian oil if his efforts to negotiate a ceasefire deal are thwarted.

Putin rejected a US-Ukrainian plan for a 30-day ceasefire, and suggested that Volodymyr Zelensky be removed from office as part of the process.

In response, Trump told NBC News: ‘If Russia and I are unable to make a deal on stopping the bloodshed in Ukraine, and if I think it was Russia’s fault — which it might not be — but if I think it was Russia’s fault, I am going to put secondary tariffs on oil, on all oil coming out of Russia.

‘That would be that if you buy oil from Russia, you can’t do business in the US.

‘There will be a 25% tariff on all oil, a 25- to 50-point tariff on all oil.’

The US president said the tariffs would come within a month if a deal is not reached.

He also stressed that he is ‘very angry’ and ‘pissed off’ over Putin’s recent attack on his Ukrainian counterpart, suggesting that Ukraine should implement a transitional government as any part of a deal, effectively pushing the war leader out of power.

Trump said that such comments were ‘not going in the right location’ for peace talks.

He further announced plans to speak with Putin this week and stressed their ‘very good relationship’, quickly adding that ‘anger dissipates quickly … if he does the right thing.’

There are fears the Russian president is ‘dragging out’ the invasion after Zelensky told European leaders at a summit in Paris that Russia ‘doesn’t want any kind of peace”

Since entering the White House, Trump has been pushing for a speedy end to the more than three-year war and holding meetings with both Russian and Ukrainian officials to facilitate it.

After all, the politician repeatedly touted that he would achieve a ceasefire on his first day in office during his campaign trail.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.

Donald Trump backtracks on axing team finding children stolen by Russia

US President Donald Trump has U-turned his decision to cut funding for a team to track down Ukrainian children stolen by Russia.

Nearly 20,000 children have been abducted by Vladimir Putin’s forces since he launched his invasion in 2022, according to Ukraine.

The Yale School of Public Health Humanitarian Research Lab has spent years rescuing hundreds of these kidnapped children.

But the group’s funding was gutted by Elon Musk’s cost-cutting agency, the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, it was revealed this month.

Amid international outcry, the Trump administration has reversed this decision, officials told The Washington Post today.

Funding will be restored for at least six weeks.

Yale’s initiative, called the Conflict Observatory, sees experts use open-source information and commercial satellite imagery to find the children.

Exactly how many children have been taken is unclear, but campaigners say Russia may have carried out the largest state-sponsored kidnapping of children in modern history.

Yale researchers have pinpointed 6,000 children taken to Russia and more than 2,400 to Belarus.

Many have not only been torn away from their loved ones, but have been tortured, denied food and forced into militaristic education.

At least 314 youngsters have become trapped in Russia’s adoption and foster system and made Russian citizens, a move that Ukraine says is erasing their Ukrainian identities and indoctrinating them with Moscow’s agenda.

A Russian parliamentarian claimed last July ‘700,000 children had found refuge’ in Russia.

This information is shared with Europol and the International Criminal Court (ICC), which is trying to bring war crime charges against Russian officials.

In 2023, the court issued arrest warrants for Putin of Russia and the Kremlin’s children’s rights commissioner, Maria Lvova-Belova, for deporting children from Ukraine.

But the Yale researchers have struggled to work since January after Trump signed an executive order freezing all foreign aid.

The news was criticised on both sides of the political aisle, with Democrats and Republicans in Congress and Christian groups urging Trump to spare the observatory.

Greg Landsman, a Democratic Representative in Ohio, said in a letter to the White House: ‘The termination of this contract never should have happened, but I’m grateful to see State change its mind.

‘This shows that bipartisan, bicameral pressure got the administration to change course, but this still isn’t good enough.’

With funding now resorted, for now at least, Yale researchers will continue sending their data to EU police officials, the State Department said.

What will happen once the provisional funding ends is unknown.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.

Putin launches new submarine equipped with ‘unstoppable’ Zircon nuclear missiles

Vladimir Putin has launched a new nuclear-powered submarine equipped with hypersonic Zircon missiles capable of travelling at several times the speed of sound.

Russian state TV footage from the Arctic port of Murmansk shows the tyrant greenlighting the launch of the vessel, named Perm after a city in the Urals, with the order: ‘I hereby authorise!’

Perm is the first nuclear-powered submarine to be equipped with Zircon missiles as a standard feature, according to Russian agencies quoting documents associated with the launch.

The Zircon has a range of 625 miles and travels at nine times the speed of sound, according to Russia.

Military analysts have said its hypersonic speed could mean greatly reduced reaction time for air defences and a capability to attack large, deep and hardened targets.

Putin has previously boasted the weapons have ‘no analogues in any country in the world’.

The Perm is the sixth submarine in Russia’s Yasen and Yasen-M classes built by the Sevmash shipyard near Murmansk.

The Russian agency reports said the vessel’s construction specifications differed slightly from earlier models in the same class.

Putin was said to have also visited a submarine named Arkhangelsk, in the same class, and toured the Atomflot enterprise, which oversees Russia’s icebreaker projects while in Murmansk.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.

The EU wants us to prepare ‘survival kits’ – but there’s a catch

People in the EU are being advised to stockpile enough food, water, and essentials for 72 hours in a continent-wide strategy to make everyone more prepared for catastrophes such as floods, fires, pandemics, and military attacks.

And it makes me feel more than a little jittery.

The suggested emergency kit should include ID documents in waterproof casing, a Swiss army knife, and playing cards, according to Hadja Lahbib, the European Commissioner for Equality, Preparedness, and Crisis Management.

It worries me when the authorities start doling out advice like this because some of my darkest childhood memories are of ‘survival manuals’ that really didn’t make me feel safe at all – and I don’t think these ones will either.

This latest advice comes just days after the French government announced that it will produce survival manuals to prepare citizens for any ‘imminent threat’ to the country. It’s a scary list of circumstances, with examples like invasions, natural disasters, industrial accidents, or a nuclear leak. 

It will suggest a ‘survival kit’ including plenty of water and food, plus basic medical supplies including paracetamol, compresses, and saline solution.

But France is not alone. Last year, Sweden told people to gather blankets and battery-powered radios, Norway suggested iodine tablets in case things go nuclear, and Germany told people to transform their cellars or garages into bunkers.

It is a cause for concern in an increasingly unstable world, and all of this brings back memories of a survival manual that absolutely petrified me when I was a kid.

The Protect and Survive pamphlet was released by the British government in the 1970s and 80s, advising us how to protect ourselves during a nuclear attack.

It was a terrifying read right from the menacing first page: ‘Read this booklet with care. Your life and the lives of your family may depend upon it.’

Things got no happier over the next 30 pages, which suggested how to build a fallout room and an inner refuge that we could stay in for two weeks and what food to stock.

The details got steadily grimmer, including special ‘sanitation arrangements’ and what to do if someone dies. Envy them, I suppose.

And I don’t think that’s changed much in the intervening decades.

If you found yourself outdoors as the mushroom cloud went up, you were advised to ‘lie flat (in a ditch) and cover the exposed skin of the head and hands’. 

People who lived in bungalows were warned that their homes would ‘not give much protection’, while those who dwelt in caravans were told, with weapons-grade dismissiveness, that ‘your local authority will be able to advise you on what to do’.

I read the booklet in 1984 as an 11-year-old, shortly after I watched Threads, the terrifyingly brilliant BBC film about nuclear war. That film traumatised me and made me determined that the horrific scenes would never come true.

So I joined the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) to try and stop a nuclear war and I read Protect and Survive to try and work out what to do if there was one.

My parents were a bit surprised when I suddenly covered my clothes in CND badges, spiked my hair up and began to spend my Saturday afternoons at peace demos rather than football matches. They were absolutely horrified when I started unscrewing the living room door.

It would be easy to say that Protect and Survive did nothing positive for me but it did. Its laughably futile advice taught me at an early age that, when push comes to shove, our rulers won’t be able to save us and we’ll have to look after ourselves. 

I’ll always be grateful for that wake-up call.

But I can trace back a disaster document scaring me even further.

I was six years old when I went on my first flight and it was quite a debut: a 24-hour flight to Australia. 

There was little inflight entertainment in those days – just a couple of films broadcast at a set time on a screen far away.

I got so bored and the only thing handy to distract me was an illustrated booklet explaining what to do if the plane crashed. 

The more I looked at the cold illustrations of oxygen masks, life rafts, people whizzing down chutes from a mangled jet, or bobbing around in the sea with only a whistle to protect them, the more my boredom turned into terror.

At six years of age, I was old enough to understand the horror of what the illustrations were depicting but not old enough to grasp that, even though we were being warned what to do if the plane crashed, that didn’t mean the plane would crash, nor that it was even likely to.

Even when I read Protect and Survive five years later I wasn’t sassy or resigned enough to understand the obvious truth that, if you find yourself under nuclear attack or in a serious plane crash, the best thing to do in either scenario might be just to simply die.

I felt more scared than informed, but maybe that’s part of the point of this sudden rush of survival manuals in Europe. 

A population that’s unsettled and on a war footing against an unspecified and unexplained threat might be more malleable and forgiving of their rulers’ performance. So maybe they’re trying to protect us, but maybe they’re trying to scare us, too.

That said, many people’s lives have been saved by following the advice in air safety briefings, and while the tips in the European manuals may seem obvious to you and me, there’s nothing wrong with being prepared, and they could save people’s lives in these precarious times we live in.

Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing jess.austin@metro.co.uk. 

Share your views in the comments below.

UK’s new ‘death ray’ weapon that can accurately destroy targets nearly a mile away

The Royal Navy will install four new cutting-edge weapons systems on its warships to help defend against air attacks from Russia and the Houthis.

Yesterday Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced in the Spring Statement that defence spending will increase to 2.5% of GDP – and some of that extra cash will go towards four DragonFire direct energy weapons.

The weapons shoot a laser of pure heat at its targets, either destroying them or seriously damaging missile guidance systems.

And they’re so accurate they could hit a target the size of a £1 coin from 0.6miles (1km) away.

It’s hoped the weapons will improve the defence capabilities of the UK Navy – boosting our capabilities both against potential threats from Russia and ongoing attacks from Houthis in the Red Sea.

Dr Sidharth Kahsual, a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), told Metro: ‘What DragonFire provides is a low cost per shot capability that fills an intermediate space between surface to air missiles, which cover many tens of kilometres, and close range weapons on a ship, which are often a last resort.

‘It’s quite power consuming, which is something the Navy will have to work around, but vessels have huge power plants anyway and their power generators have enormous output.’

The DragonFire ‘death laser’ comes to life after the ship’s radar detects an incoming threat such as a missile or drone. DragonFire will then target and track its path, before shooting it down with a 55kilowatt laser which burns a hole through it.

It hasn’t yet been confirmed which Navy ships will be fitted with the new weapon, but it’s thought four of our six Type 45 destroyers will receive them, with the HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales potentially receiving them at a later date, MailOnline reports.

The direct energy weapons are ‘certainly’ an area of interest for navies around the world, Dr Kashual said, adding that the US Navy has recently trialed similar weapons.

He explained that these types of weapon have a ‘high performance for its output’ and are ‘pretty cleverly engineered’.

One major bonus of the DragonFire system is that it is powered using existing power systems already located on board.

This means it doesn’t need expensive ammo, costing only about £10 to fire, and reduces how often a ship needs to dock to receive more ammo for conventional weapons.

Dr David Blagden is associate professor in international security and strategy at the University of Exeter. He told Metro that DragonFire does have its limits.

‘Lasers rely on direct line-of-sight, can be impeded by things like smoke or vapour, might be countered by incoming weapons’ own heat shielding, and will need to be aimed quickly and accurately enough by a sufficiently advanced targeting radar,’ he explained.

‘But DragonFire can be a valuable complement to such air defence missiles and guns, unencumbered by the same scarcity constraints, particularly for defending against things like drone swarms, where each incoming munition is not especially fast or capable by itself, but where adversaries may try to swamp traditional air defence missiles and guns with the sheer number of attack drones.’

Before the Spring Statement, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) had only committed to installing one prototype DragonFire on a single ship.

It’s hoped the new weapons will be able to cheaply and efficiently destroy cheap drones or missiles, such as those used by the Houthis, at a much lower cost – saving resources in case of escalation of the war in Ukraine.

‘Russia relies quite heavily on missile attacks to hold stronger navies at arm’s length, so this improvement of air missile defence represents something of a challenge for them,’ Dr Kahsual explained.

‘Some of the weapons used by Russia tend to be designed to overwhelm defence by brute force, their speed leaves little time to react, so DragonFire doesn’t fundamentally change that.

‘Where it becomes more useful is second tier situations like the Houthis in the Red Sea where everybody is relatively constrained.

‘The most important impact of DragonFire will be in places like the Red Sea that doesn’t draw down resources in the EU.’

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.

EU warns millions to stockpile supplies in case of war – should the UK do the same?

The European Union has told its almost 450million citizens to prepare for war or natural disaster by assembling ’72 hour survival kits’.

But as the UK ramps up defence spending and assembles a ‘coalition of the willing’ to protect Ukraine, British preparedness for conflict is now under the microscope.

The British government has not yet asked Britons to compile their own war survival kits, but they have a been preparing pages of advice on what we should do if other disasters takes hold.

Experts have also weighed in and told Metro that crisis packs could be crucial far earlier than a future military conflict might have you think.

Why did the European Union choose 72 hour stockpiles?

The stockpile order is driven by cyber conflict and not by a fear of military conflict, says Professor Peter Jackson, the University of Glasgow’s Chair in Global Security.

This is because while it might take seven years for Russia to be ready for another ground invasion of a Western country, they have the power to launch other kinds of attacks.

He told Metro: ‘Russia is very capable and much inclined to mount very sophisticated attacks on national infrastructure.

‘So much of our critical infrastructure happens online.

‘If a cyber attack was able to hit at power stations, for example, and deprive citizens of access to electricity.

‘Those are the kind of scenarios a 72 hour pack would be intended to combat. I do not think it is about the Russians invading.

‘If traffic alarms go out, or the banking system goes down. A cyber attack could throw British and European society into quite considerable chaos.

‘Starter packs make more sense in those scenarios.’

One little known weak spot are the ‘vital undersea cables which converge in Irish waters’ and which Ireland is underprepared to protect.

The Professor added: ‘There are lots of vulnerabilities that would be targeted long before the British public would be threatened with another land war.’

Russia needs to rely on cyber conflict because a military one would be entirely different to anything going on in Ukraine.

One example is Finland, a top Putin target, says Peter.

The country has 180,000 ‘very well trained and highly motivated troops’, making invasion a very tough obstacle for Russia.

Should the UK issue a similar stockpile warning to the European Union?

So should the UK do the same? Professor Jackson thinks Starmer should focus on other things first.

‘We should be increasing the security of Britain’s critical infrastructure and our ability to thwart cyber attacks,’ he added.

‘I think it is already a priority for the UK government, but it will only become more acute, especially as the UK industry becomes more oriented toward defence production.’

Army veteran and survival guru Leigh Price, however, believes we should all have a survival kit, even if the likelihood of an invasion ‘is small’.

Leigh, who runs survival courses and sells survival equipment from the Bug Out Shop, told Metro: ‘An emergency kit is still a good idea.

‘We cannot totally prepare for conflict. If you had to vacate your home, you need a survival kit in your bag to grab at a moment’s notice.

‘If you are at home and a missile strikes, you have got to make sure you have stuff at home to make your life comfortable.’

What should we pack in a survival kit?

Veteran Leigh says there are four priorities for what we need to include in our emergency pack: food, water, shelter and medical first aid.

His range of freeze-dried tinned food – his most popular item – can last until 2050. After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, he says prices of food tins skyrocketed by 56%.

The survival pro added: ‘There is only so much perishable food you can cover, so that is why you need ‘freeze-dried food.

‘But you also need some way of heating it your food, so your kit needs to have a little stove.’

People often pack in three-day emergency kits with bottled water, but Leigh says that does not go far enough.

‘Water bottles are also only going to go so far. If you want to up your game you can get a water filter, so you can filter anything you find,’ he added.

Swiss Army knives also commonly feature in survival kit guides, but there may be more important blades and basics we should prioritise.

‘You do not want everyone running round with a knife like John Rambo. You might needs tins of food, you have just got to cover the basics like a tin opener.

‘You need personal documents to identify yourself. There might be an injury, what is your blood type? What allergies do you have?

‘You also will need warm clothing.’What happens in the first 72 hours of a natural disaster or war?

What does the government tell us to do in case of an emergency?

The EU’s announcement comes just a week after France decided to issue 20-page survival manuals.

In it are 63 measures on how the French can protect themselves from armed conflict, natural disasters, industrial accidents and nuclear leaks.

Keir Starmer has not done the same in the UK.

In fact, Metro could not find a single government web page dedicated to advice to Brits in case of a military conflict hitting the UK.

There are other government pages with information on more general ‘natural hazards’, infrastructure failure’ or ‘severe weather’.

‘Emergencies happen every day in the UK and across the world,’ the government’s ‘Prepare’ campaign website says.

Officials advice for us to be informed about the risks in our local area, and to accordingly sign up for alerts and warnings.

We should also learn basic first aid skills.

There is also a downloadable and printable household emergency plan, which includes emergency contact details and a three-step plan of action in cases disaster strikes outside your house.

The government tells us to ‘go in’, ‘stay in’ and ‘tune in’.

This means close all windows and doors, stay inside, and tune in to national and local news and follow official advice for what to do next.

If war does come to Europe, Professor Jackson is concerned the UK and Europe need to prepare for the U.S. to remain on the sidelines.

He said: ‘The EU and UK need to invest heavily in the intelligence assets the US military enjoys. Such as imaging, geo-spacing, and very powerful listening capabilities.

‘They also need a replacement for Starlink.’

Starlink is the constellation of satellites owned by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, and has been used by Ukraine to carry out military operations against Russia.

Peter warned Europe and the UK they need to be ready for a world in which they cannot access Musk’s space network.

‘If it gets shut down, they are in real real trouble’.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.

Britain and France sending military teams to Ukraine to ‘deter’ Putin

British and French military teams will be deployed to Ukraine in ‘coming days’, Emmanuel Macron has confirmed.

The delegation from the UK and France will be sent to work with Ukrainian armed forces as part of a ‘reassurance force’, even if the idea is not backed by all European allies.

This was revealed after a summit in Paris aimed at strengthening Ukraine’s hand and its military, attended by Sir Keir Starmer, Volodymyr Zelensky and other Western leaders.

‘In very specific terms, we agreed that the prime minister of Great Britain and I will instruct our chiefs of defence to ensure that a Franco-British team is sent to Ukraine within a few days for very close cooperation with our Ukrainian partners,’ Macron told reporters earlier this afternoon.

He made the announcement about the military delegation to Ukraine – but said the decision is ‘not unanimous’.

Such a force would also not be a substitute for any peacekeeping soldiers on the ground maintaining any ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.

‘Nothing has been ruled out, we will look at sea forces, ground forces and air forces,’ the French leader warned.

‘This reassurance force should not substitute the peacekeeping forces on the contact line or the strong and robust Ukrainian army.’

He acknowledged that Vladimir Putin has not agreed to such a plan but ‘it is not up to Russia what happens on Ukrainian soil’.

‘So there will be a reassurance force bringing together several European forces and it will be deployed,’ Macron added.

Sir Keir later described it as a ‘deterrence force’, saying: ‘This is a force designed to deter, in order to send that message to Putin that this is a deal that is going to be defended – that’s the best description of it.’

It remains unclear which European countries have agreed to sending a team to Ukraine.

But the British PM stressed that US involvement is needed to proceed with the plan.

Leaders in Paris also agreed that sanctions against Russia should not be lifted, and instead ramped up, until the war is halted.

Sir Keir said there was ‘complete clarity’ that now is not the time for the lifting of sanctions.

‘Quite the contrary – what we discussed is how we can increase sanctions to support the US initiative to bring Russia to the table from further pressure,’ he added.

Got a story? Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk. Or you can submit your videos and pictures here.

For more stories like this, check our news page.

Follow Metro.co.uk on Twitter and Facebook for the latest news updates. You can now also get Metro.co.uk articles sent straight to your device. Sign up for our daily push alerts here.