Carabinieri Arrests Suspect Of Coordinator Of Attack On Three Nord Stream Gas Pipes

Nord Stream gas pipeline explosion. (Twitter/@nexta_tv)

JAKARTA - A Ukrainian man was arrested at a holiday interest in Italy on suspicion of coordinating an attack on three Nord Stream gas pipelines in 2022, officials said on Thursday.

Carabinieri officers arrested the suspect in San Clemente on the coast of Adriatic Italy, where he was supposed to spend several days with his family.

"After his whereabouts were confirmed, Carabinieri surrounded the Bungalo and launched a raid. The man gave up without a fight," Carabinieri said in a statement, adding the suspect was 49 years old.

A police official told Reuters the suspect was arrested for giving documents during a hotel check-in, a warning stating he was wanted to appear at police headquarters, which then sent a Carabinieri police patrol.

The suspect, identified only as Serhi K. under German privacy law, is part of a group of people who installed devices on a pipeline network near Bornholm Island, Denmark, in the Baltic Sea, according to a statement from the prosecutor's office.

He and his colleagues departed from Rostock on Germany's northeastern coast on a cruise ship to carry out the attack, he said. The ship was chartered from a German company with the help of fake identity documents through intermediaries, he added.

Authorities are following up on a European arrest warrant for the suspect, who faces collusion charges to lead to explosions, anti-constitutional sabotage, and the destruction of important buildings.

Described by Moscow and the West as an act of sabotage, the explosion largely cut off Russia's gas supply to Europe, triggering a major escalation in the Ukrainian conflict and suppressing energy supply on the continent. No one claimed responsibility for the explosion and Ukraine denied any involvement.

The arrests came just as Kyiv engages in tense diplomatic discussions with the United States about how to end the war in Ukraine without providing a large concession and most of its own territory to Russia.

"Politically, we stand firmly on the Ukrainian side and will continue to be so," Justice Minister Stefanie Hubig said when asked if the arrests would affect Berlin's relations with Kyiv.

"What matters to me is Germany is a state of law, and crimes in our jurisdiction are fully investigated," he added.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the suspect is a retired captain in the Ukrainian armed forces and previously served in the Ukrainian security service SBU, as well as in elite units defending Kyiv in the early months of Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022.

The officer is said to have led a team of two soldiers and four civilian divers who were secretly recruited by a special Ukrainian military unit to lay explosives that damaged underwater pipes, the WSJ said, citing investigators.

German prosecutors declined to comment on the WSJ report.

Separately, an official at the Ukrainian presidential office said he could not comment because it was unclear who had been arrested. The official reiterated Ukraine's rebuttal to any involvement in the blast.

Meanwhile, Russian Ambassador to Germany Sergei Nechayev, told state news agency TASS Moscow continued to demand "objective and thorough investigation into the terrorist act".

He also criticized what he called "slight" information about the case given by German authorities.

The Ukrainian government has consecutively viewed the pipelines as symbols and vehicles, for Russia's grip on the European energy supply that Kyiv says has made it difficult for action against Moscow since Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014.

It is known that one of the two Nord Stream 2 pipelines was damaged by a mysterious explosion in September 2022, as were the two Nord Stream 1 pipelines that flowed Russian gas to Europe.

Moscow, without providing evidence, blamed Western sabotage for the explosion, which cut off most of Russia's gas supply to the lucrative European market. The US denies involvement in the attack.

The Washington Post and German Der Spiegel magazine previously said the team carrying out the attack was formed by a former Ukrainian intelligence officer, who denied involvement.

In January 2023, Germany raided a ship that it said might be used to transport explosives and told the UN it believed trained divers might have installed equipment into pipes at a depth of about 70 to 80 meters.

The ship, leased in Germany through a company registered in Poland, contains traces of octogens, the same explosives found at the site of the underwater explosion, according to investigations by Germany, Denmark, and Sweden.