(The message sent on March 7th, 2023 at 9:03 p.m. was corrected. ARD and “Zeit” have corrected their information. The yacht made a stopover in Wiek on Rügen. The last paragraph has been corrected accordingly.)
BERLIN (dpa-AFX) – In the case of the explosions on the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines at the end of September 2022, there are new speculations about the perpetrators, according to media reports. According to research by ARD, SWR and “Zeit”, the tracks apparently lead in the direction of Ukraine. Citing information from the secret service, it was said that a pro-Ukrainian group could be responsible. Authorities in Germany, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and the USA were involved in the investigation, reported “Zeit” online on Tuesday evening. From the German side, the federal government and the responsible federal prosecutor did not comment specifically on the reports when asked.
“The Federal Public Prosecutor (GBA) has been investigating the matter since the beginning of October 2022,” said government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit. “Most recently, Sweden, Denmark and Germany informed the United Nations Security Council that the investigations are ongoing and that there are still no results,” he said. According to a spokeswoman, the GBA did not want to comment on Tuesday evening. The advisor in the Ukrainian presidential office, Mykhailo Podoliak, firmly denied any involvement by Ukraine. Ukraine has nothing to do with the accident in the Baltic Sea and no information about pro-Ukrainian sabotage groups, he tweeted.
From the US side, the communications director of the US government’s National Security Council, John Kirby, referred to the ongoing investigations in Germany and Scandinavia. “We believe it was an act of sabotage,” he said. First, the investigation must be terminated. Only then can we talk about how to proceed. Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said at a press conference with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg that he had no further comments. Stoltenberg said they knew it was an attack, a sabotage. It would be wrong to speculate about who is behind this before the investigation is complete.
According to media reports, investigators have so far found no evidence of who commissioned the destruction. However, they identified a boat that could have been used for the Baltic Sea venture. The yacht in question was rented from a company based in Poland, which “apparently belongs to two Ukrainians,” it said. In addition, a team consisting of a captain, two divers, two diving assistants and a doctor brought the explosives to the crime scenes, according to investigations.
The nationalities of the people were unclear, the report said. Apparently they used fake passports. The authorities had found out that the boat probably broke up in Rostock before the pipeline explosion on September 6th. After that they found it in Wiek on the Baltic Sea island of Rügen and on the Danish island of Christiansø, north-east of Bornholm. The Ministry of the Interior in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania did not comment on this and referred to the GBA./jon/DP/jha