Germany issues an arrest warrant in the case of undermining «Nord Stream» — Ukrainian Volodymyr Z.

In addition to Volodymyr Z., two other Ukrainian citizens are suspected of acting as divers and attaching explosives to gas pipelines.

The German prosecutor’s office issued the first arrest warrant in the Nord Stream — case, looking for a Ukrainian, who is referred to in the documents as Volodymyr Z. (according to materials from German publicationsreferred to by Babel).

Investigators assume that Volodymyr Z. has recently been living in a city near Warsaw and have already applied to the Polish authorities with a European arrest warrant, but they failed to detain the suspect within the 60-day period prescribed by the rules.

In addition to Volodymyr Z., the case involves two other Ukrainians, Yevhen and Svitlana U., who allegedly acted as divers and attached explosives to gas pipelines. All three were traveling in the Baltic Sea on a German sailing yacht «Andromeda» in September 2022.

During a telephone conversation with journalists, Vladimir Z. denied any involvement in the attack on «Nord Stream».

The arrest warrant was probably issued after questioning the driver of a van seen on the German island of Rügen in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The van was allegedly used to transport diving equipment — the driver was picking up Ukrainians and allegedly recognized Vladimir Z in the photos.

Two men and a woman were traveling on a yacht «Andromeda» in September 2022 — they departed from Rostock and stopped in Rügen, the Danish island of Christiansoe, Sandhamn in Sweden, and Kolobrzeg in Poland. One of the sailors claimed to have heard the crew speaking Ukrainian. Polish law enforcement officers stopped the yacht and conducted an inspection, which proved «the purely tourist purpose of the trip».

Yevhen and Svitlana U. are very active in social media and actively support the Ukrainian Armed Forces. The woman, who now lives in Kyiv, said in a telephone conversation that she knew nothing about the attacks on the gas pipelines and was on vacation in Bulgaria at the time.

As a reminder, the explosions in the «Nord Stream — 1» and «Nord Stream — 2» pipelines, which caused massive gas leaks, occurred on September 26, 2022. The US, UK, and EU governments claimed deliberate sabotage, while Russia spoke of interest in the explosions from the US and its allies and was going to mothball «Nord Stream» because it had no plans for repairs.

Sweden and Denmark opened their investigations, but eventually dropped them. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy denied Ukraine’s involvement in the attack.