A court in London has set a trial date for April 2026 for two Ukrainians accused of organising a series of arson attacks against property linked to Prime Minister Keir Starmer. A spokesman for the Crown Prosecution Service told Radio Liberty on 6 June.
Suspects Roman Lavrynovych and Petro Pochinko, and Romanian Stanislav Carpiuc, who is also charged in the case, pleaded not guilty at a 6 June hearing at London’s Old Bailey Court.
Judge Bobby Cheema-Grubb ordered the three men to be remanded in custody until the next hearing in October, with a trial date scheduled for April 2026.
British counter-terrorism police are investigating how and why the three defendants, as well as a fourth man whose name is not being made public, likely set fire to a car and two homes linked to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer. No one was injured in either of the fires, which occurred in May.
A fourth man was arrested at London’s Stansted Airport in connection with the arson earlier this week and subsequently released on bail.
Starmer called the incidents “an attack on all of us, on our democracy and the values we stand for.”
In May, the Financial Times reported, citing sources, that British intelligence agencies were investigating Russian involvement in arson attacks on property linked to Prime Minister Keir Starmer.