The Biden administration on Monday imposed on “seven leading members of a Russian intelligence-linked malign influence group” for their roles in trying to destabilize the government of Moldova.

According to the US Treasury Department, those who were sanctioned Monday were involved in a plot involving anti-government protests in Moldova earlier this year in an effort “to foment a manufactured insurrection against the Moldovan government.”

“In February 2023, the group organized protest training, likely in support of a Moldova-focused destabilization plot,” the Treasury Department said in a press release. “During the protests, members of the aforementioned malign influence group oversaw the movement of some personnel to locations in Moldova, including Chisinau.”

The people hit with the sanctions Monday are Konstantin Prokopyevich Sapozhnikov, Yury Yuryevich Makolov, Gleb Maksimovich Khloponin, Svetlana Andreyevna Boyko, Aleksey Vyacheslavovich Losev, Vasily Viktorovich Gromovikov and Anna Travnikova.

In addition, the Treasury Department alleges that the actors sanctioned Monday “are part of a large global information operation connected to the Russian Federation that targets Ukraine, countries bordering Ukraine including Moldova, Balkan countries, the European Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States.”

“These actors provoked, trained, and oversaw groups in democratic countries that conduct anti-government protests, rallies, marches, and demonstrations. These malign influence operatives analyze countries vulnerable to exploitation and stoke fears that undermine faith in democratic principles in the targeted countries,” they said.