Italy Arrests Ukrainian Man Accused of Helping Bomb Nord Stream Gas Pipelines

German prosecutors allege the suspect coordinated the charter of a yacht used to plant explosives in the Baltic Sea.

Swedish Coast Guard via Getty Images
Gas bubbles up from the damaged Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea on September 27, 2022. Swedish Coast Guard via Getty Images

A Ukrainian national is under arrest in Italy for allegedly helping to carry out the 2022 bombing attack on the Nord Stream undersea gas pipelines between Russia and Europe.

The suspect, partially identified by federal prosecutors in Germany as Serhii K, was nabbed by police officers in the Italian province of Rimini on Thursday and is “believed to have been one of the coordinators of the operation,” according to CBS News.

The suspect is also alleged to be a part of a group including divers who “placed explosive devices on the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines.”

The Nord Stream pipelines, which connected Russia and Germany under the Baltic Sea, suffered significant damage in September 2022 due to underwater explosions that are widely believed to have been an act of sabotage.

According to reports from German media, an investigation pointed to a Ukrainian cell as responsible. The governments of both Ukraine and Russia have strongly denied any involvement in the incident.

The investigative findings suggest that saboteurs chartered a yacht named Andromeda from the port of Rostock to carry out the attack.

“The yacht had previously been rented from a German company with the help of forged identity documents obtained through intermediaries,” prosecutors in Germany said.

An arrest warrant was issued last year for another Ukrainian man, a diving instructor whose last known address was in Poland. Prosecutors there received the warrant for the man, identified only as Volodymyr Z., but said he departed for Ukraine before he could be arrested, according to a report from Agence France-Presse. 

It was believed at the time that he may have been one of the divers who planted the explosives.

Thursday’s arrest was the first connected to the investigation.


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