Ukrainian former officer stands trial in Germany for Nord Stream sabotage

A former Ukrainian special forces officer went on trial in Hamburg on Wednesday, accused of leading the sabotage operation that bombed the Nord Stream gas pipelines in September 2022.

The defendant, identified by German authorities as Sergiy Kuznietsov or Serhii K., is the first person to face trial for the blasts that damaged three of the four pipelines under the Baltic Sea. According to Euronews, prosecutors allege Kuznietsov entered Germany with a forged passport and led a team including divers and an explosives expert. The group reportedly set sail from Rostock on a rented yacht carrying military-grade explosives to a location near the Danish island of Bornholm.

Kuznietsov was arrested in Italy last year before being extradited to Germany, where he now faces charges of carrying out a war crime, attacking civilian infrastructure, and causing an explosion. His legal team attempted to challenge the court's jurisdiction and may argue the pipelines were legitimate military targets. However, the news magazine Stern reported that the defendant will refuse to testify, citing a ban on former Ukrainian special forces members speaking publicly about their service.

The trial, which Al Jazeera reports is expected to continue through February, has drawn public attention to Germany's political relationship with Ukraine. Outside the courthouse in Hamburg, Euronews observed a small group of pro-Ukrainian demonstrators protesting the proceedings with placards that questioned the definition of war crimes and labeled Russia a terrorist state.

While initial Western suspicions after the 2022 explosions fell on Russia, German investigators eventually identified a Ukrainian cell as the suspected perpetrators. France 24 noted that the operation severed Western Europe’s largest source of Russian natural gas, though deliveries through Nord Stream 1 had already been suspended by Moscow at the time of the attack.

Background

In September 2022, seven months after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, underwater explosions damaged the Nord Stream infrastructure. The pipelines were owned by a consortium led by the Russian energy company Gazprom.