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French police have arrested four people, including a Russian woman who runs a France-based non-profit group, on suspicion of spying for a foreign power.
Prosecutors in Paris said on Wednesday that three of the people charged had been placed in provisional detention. A fourth man, also accused of “colluding with a foreign power”, was banned from leaving France and has to check in with police.
Two of the people, prosecutors added, were of Russian nationality. This includes a Franco-Russian woman, named by authorities as “Anna N”, who founded the SOS Donbass association, which describes itself as helping people in the eastern Ukrainian region.
The non-profit, which calls on its website for an end to deliveries of weapons to the Ukrainian army and for the formation of a “bridge of peace” between Europe and Russia, lists Anna Novikova as its founder. It could not immediately be reached for comment.
She had been under surveillance since January, prosecutors said, as French national security officers looked into actions by her that “could harm the fundamental interests of the nation”.
“She was in particular suspected of approaching executives at various French companies to obtain information about French economic interests,” prosecutors said.
The arrests occurred on November 20 and 21, after investigators also found a link to another incident — the plastering of pro-Russian posters on the Arc de Triomphe.
The posters, carrying the tagline “Say thank you to the triumphant Soviet soldier”, were found in early September on the Parisian monument. This echoed other incidents in recent years, such as empty coffins left near the Eiffel Tower in 2024 — apparently to deter French military support for Ukraine — which prompted a probe into whether Russia or groups linked to Russia had orchestrated the stunt.
Video surveillance footage led police to a Russian man in the case of the posters, and he was among those arrested in recent days, prosecutors said. He was then found to have been in phone contact with “Anna N”, they added.
She is accused of crimes that could add up to 45 years in jail and €600,000 in fines, including participating in organised crime and spying and intelligence for a foreign power.
