GERMAN PROSECUTORS HAVE issued an arrest warrant for a Ukrainian man over the 2022 sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines, according to a number of German media reports today.
A European arrest warrant was requested in June for the man, whose last known address is in Poland, according to the ARD broadcaster and newspapers Die Zeit and the Sueddeutsche Zeitung.
It is not clear yet why Polish authorities weren’t able to arrest the suspect, they said, and the man is now believed to have taken flight.
German investigators believe the Ukrainian, named only as Volodymyr Z., was one of the divers who planted explosive devices on the Nord Stream pipelines, according to the reports.
The federal prosecution service declined to comment when contacted by the AFP news agency.
The Polish prosecutor’s office has confirmed to AFP that it received the warrant for the man in June “in connection with proceedings against him in Germany”.
“Ultimately, Volodymyr Z. was not detained, as he left the territory of Poland at the beginning of July this year, crossing the Polish-Ukrainian border,” the prosecutor’s office said in an email.
German investigators have also identified two more Ukrainians, a man and a woman, who they believe acted as divers in the attacks, the reports said.
However, no arrest warrants has yet been issued for the pair of suspects.
A number of German media outlets reported today that they had reached Volodymyr Z. and the woman in question, who both denied any involvement.
Last year, a German media investigation quoted unnamed officials as saying that five men and a woman used a yacht hired by a Ukrainian-owned company in Poland to carry out the sabotage operation.
Four large gas leaks were discovered in September 2022 on Nord Stream’s two pipelines off the Danish island of Bornholm, with seismic institutes recording two underwater explosions just beforehand.
The pipelines run between Russia and Germany and had been at the centre of geopolitical tensions after the Kremlin cut gas supplies to Europe in apparent retaliation for Western sanctions resulting from the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine was quick to blame Russia for the sabotage, as were a number of other European officials. Russian President Vladimir Putin blamed both Ukraine and its allies in the US and UK. All four governments have denied culpability.
Just weeks before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, US President Joe Biden said: “If Russia invades, that means tanks or troops crossing the border of Ukraine again, then there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.”
Pulitzer Prize-winning American reporter Seymour Hersh wrote in a blog post in February last year that the US was behind the explosions. The report relied on a single unnamed source and the Biden administration dismissed it as “utterly false and complete fiction.”
While the gas leaks were in international waters, two were in Denmark’s exclusive economic zone and two in Sweden’s.
The pipelines were not in operation when the leaks occurred, but they still contained gas which spewed up through the water and into the atmosphere.
Denmark, Sweden and Germany all opened investigations into the explosions.
However, Denmark and Sweden both closed their investigations in February of this year.
Swedish investigators concluded the country’s courts did not have jurisdiction over the case while Danish police said there were insufficient grounds to pursue the case in Denmark.
Before the Swedish investigation came to an end, prosecutors concluded that the explosions were the result of sabotage likely carried out by a state actor.
With reporting from - © AFP 2024
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