A Ukrainian has been detained in Poland in connection with the 2022 Nord Stream gas pipelines explosions.
The man, wanted in Germany and who cannot be named under Polish law, was arrested yesterday in a Warsaw suburb on the basis of a European arrest warrant issued by a German court.
His attorney Tymoteusz Paprocki confirmed the detention and vowed a “very active” defence against his client’s extradition to Germany. The lawyer said his client would not comment on whether he played any role in the damaging of the Nord Stream pipeline.
Paprocki argued that, given Russia’s war in Ukraine, damaging infrastructure owned by a Russian State-controlled company should not be considered a “crime”.
“The attack on Nord Stream infrastructure concerns one of the pipeline’s owners, Gazprom, which directly finances the military operations in Ukraine,” he claimed.
The blasts wrecked three of four Nord Stream pipelines, which had become a controversial symbol of German reliance on Russian gas in the wake of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
German intelligence has indicated it believes the detained Ukrainian, reportedly a diving instructor, was allegedly directly involved in the blasts.
In August, German investigators identified seven people they believe carried out the bombing and several days later, Italian police arrested a Ukrainian man suspected of co-ordinating the attacks.
Another suspect is said to have since been killed while serving with Ukraine’s armed forces.
Germany then issued arrest warrants for the remaining five Ukrainian nationals suspected of taking part in the pipeline incident. They included the individual detained in Poland who is alleged to have been a part of the team that planted the explosives.
Swedish and Danish investigators said in 2022 that the blasts on the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines were an act of sabotage after traces of explosives were found at the site of the explosions. The blasts ruptured three of the four pipelines on the Baltic seabed and cut most Russian gas supplies to western Europe.
The investigators closed their investigations this February without identifying any suspects.
Russian naval vessels had been spotted near the site, although Moscow has denied responsibility and blamed the US, Ukraine and Britain for the blasts.
Russia seized on a social media post by Radosław Sikorski, who in 2022 was a member of the European Parliament. Moscow pointed to a photograph of the site of the damaged Nord Stream pipelines under which Sikorski had apparently written: “Thank you USA!” displaying a post of the then-former Polish foreign minister as evidence of US involvement.
Ukraine has denied any involvement, as have the US and Britain, but there have been allegations in German and other western media that Ukraine and Poland co-operated over the destruction of the pipelines.
The German justice ministry and the federal prosecutor’s office have not responded to requests from Brussels Signal for comment, nor were the Polish prosecutors ready to make any statements.
In August, Polish prosecutors reported they had received a European arrest warrant issued by Berlin in connection with the pipeline attack but claimed the suspect the Germans were seeking had already left the country.
