German investigators have claimed that one of the chief suspects in the destruction of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline admitted on tape to be an agent of the Ukrainian military and secret service.
Serhiy Kuznetsov, who is currently on trial in Germany, accused of being a mastermind behind the September 2022 attacks that led to the sabotage of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline from Russia, is alleged by German prosecutors to have previously admitted to doing so on behalf of Kyiv.
Although Ukraine has consistently denied involvement in the attack, German investigators claim to have obtained a recording of Kuznetsov speaking in a phone call made to his wife while under police custody in Italy.
According to German broadcaster NTV, the Ukrainian national is alleged to have told his wife on the call that he did so at the behest of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU).
During his phone calls from prison in Italy, Kuznetsov is said to have felt “abandoned” by his country and President Volodymyr Zelensky after being arrested over the attack.
It has also been claimed by the German prosecution team that in a phone call, the Ukrainian national sought to speak to his “commander”, whom he called “Roman”. This is believed to be in reference to Roman Chervinskyi, a top Kyiv intelligence officer, who has long been tied to the alleged plot to blow up the pipelines.
According to previous reporting from the Washington Post and Germany’s Der Spiegel news magazine, Colonel Roman Chervinsky, a former member of Ukraine’s Special Forces, was in charge of “logistics and support” for a six-man team that is said to have used rented sailboats and diving equipment and ultimately attached bombs to the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines and blew them up, severely disrupting the flow of energy from Russia to Germany and elsewhere in Europe.
The report added that Chervinsky was believed to have received his orders for the scheme from “senior Ukrainian officials,” including General Valery Zaluzhny, who was the country’s highest-ranking military officer at the time.
Separate reporting from the Wall Street Journal has claimed that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was personally involved with the plot to destroy the pipelines, but allegedly called off the plan after the American CIA intelligence agency became aware of the plot. The report claimed that Gen. Zaluzhny continued with the plan, regardless.
The destruction of the pipelines, which may have been one of the most significant attacks on modern infrastructure in the 21st century, has been the subject of heavy speculation, with figures from the United States and Russia accusing each other of being the architects of the plot. Moscow had at one point even attempted to blame the British for the attack, accusations which London said were “false claims of an epic scale”.
However, there appears to be a growing consensus in Germany that the attack originated in Ukraine. While the pipelines were not active at the time of the attack in 2022 — with Putin having suspended gas flows in retaliation to Western sanctions — the cut off of cheap pipeline gas has had a major impact on the economy of Germany, which has been forced to buy more expensive natural gas from the United States and elsewhere to meet its needs. This has led calls from some German politicians, including AfD leader Alice Weidel, to demand that Kyiv pay Berlin reparations for the damage done to the German economy.