An alleged conspiracy to kill Armin Papperger, the CEO of arms manufacturer Rheinmetall, which has led the German manufacturing charge in support of Kyiv, is reportedly being treated as part of Russia's wider sabotage and attack campaign against European NATO states.
Citing two senior NATO diplomats, Financial Times reported protections around the defense boss were "at the highest level" — similar to the protection of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. Papperger told FT that Berlin had established a "great level of security around my person."
He also said he believed the outline contained in the CNN report — that U.S. intelligence uncovered the effort and alerted German authorities, who were then able to foil the plot.
"I think CNN is not just looking up at the sky," he said when asked about the validity of the story.
According to FT, Papperger angered the Kremlin in 2023 when he announced plans to build a Panther tank factory in Ukraine, which the Russian foreign ministry threatened to destroy.
FT reported that Jens Stoltenberg, NATO's secretary-general, declined to comment on the specific assassination report but said: "What I can say is there is a pattern, a Russian campaign organized by the [Kremlin] security services to conduct hostile actions against NATO allies ... with different types of hostile actions.
"These are not standalone incidents but part of a campaign. And the purpose of the campaign is to intimidate NATO allies from supporting Ukraine," Stoltenberg added, FT reported.
A spokesperson for the National Security Council told the outlet, "Russia's actions will not deter allies from continuing to support Ukraine."
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.