German intelligence chief Bruno Kahl has said that Putin "declared war" on the West, Spiegel reports.
The heads of the Federal Intelligence Service, the Office for the Protection of the Constitution and military counterintelligence warned against further Russian actions, saying that political assassinations in Germany are also possible.
Putin's actions are "a declaration of war against the entire free, democratic world," said Bruno Kahl, head of the Federal Intelligence Service (BND). "A smoldering systemic rivalry has turned into an open struggle," said Thomas Haldenwang, president of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution.
Both heads of the agencies spoke at the hearing in the Bundestag. Once a year, the parliamentary oversight body, which usually meets only in closed session, meets in public and asks the three heads of the federal intelligence services - the BND, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) and the Military Counterintelligence Service (MAD) - for their assessment of the current situation in the country.
