The Kremlin has accused Britain of plotting “mass raids” on Russia’s “shadow fleet” in a bid to use media coverage to pressure the US to take secondary sanctions on Moscow’s energy buyers.

A statement by Russia’s foreign intelligence service (SVR) claimed that British intelligence services, with the involvement of NATO allies, is planning attacks on the fleet of old tankers used to avoid oil sanctions. For this purpose, an “ecological catastrophe in international waters is being prepared,” the SVR report claimed.

According to London’s plan, such a campaign should be triggered by “a resonant incident involving one or more tankers.”

“This will free the West’s hands in choosing methods of counteraction. In the extreme case, this could involve detaining any “suspicious” vessels in international waters and escorting them to the ports of NATO states,” the statement reads.

This plan, it said, provides for a major act of sabotage to force Washington into sanctioning buyers of Russian energy.

According to the SVR, the British are working on “two potential casus belli.” The first scenario implicates setting up a tanker accident in one of bottlenecks of sea communications (for example, in straits). “The oil spill and blocking of the fairway, as London believes, would provide NATO countries with ‘sufficient’ grounds to create a precedent of an “emergency inspection” of the vessel under the guise of maritime safety and environmental regulations compliance,” the statement noted.

“The second scenario involves setting fire to a tanker during loading in a port in a state friendly to Russia. It is assumed that the fire would cause significant damage to the port infrastructure and spread to other vessels, which would require an international investigation,” the SVR emphasized.

It went on to claim that the UK intends to “choose the moment for the attack” in order to best exploit media coverage and put pressure on the Trump administration.

“The aim is to force Washington, contrary to its national interests, to adopt the toughest secondary sanctions against buyers of Russian energy resources, who will appear to be ‘indirect culprits of the tragedy’,” the report said.

“The plan calls for organizing a major act of sabotage, the damage from which will make it possible to declare the transportation of Russian oil a threat to all international shipping.”

It further alleged that London intends to entrust the execution of both attacks to Ukrainian special forces.

British authorities have not immediately commented on Russia’s claims.