Zelensky initially approved attack on Nord Stream gas pipeline, Wall Street Journal says

The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) published exclusive information on Thursday about how the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipeline between Russia and Germany in September 2022 was organized, in which it is stated that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky initially approved the plan, but then tried to cancel it without success.


North Stream Gas Pipelines

Each one transports 55 billion cubic meters of gas per year.

Longitudinal view

from the pipe

The pipeline sections are located at a depth of between 80 and 110 metres.

Protection

anti-corrosion

Coating

concrete

Coating

antifriction

GRAPHIC: IGNACIO SÁNCHEZ. SOURCE: NORDSTREAM

North Stream Gas Pipelines

Each one transports 55 billion cubic meters of gas per year.

Longitudinal view

from the pipe

The pipe sections are located at a

depth between 80 and 110 meters.

Protection

anti-corrosion

Coating

concrete

Coating

antifriction

GRAPHIC: IGNACIO SÁNCHEZ. SOURCE: NORDSTREAM


“Ukraine's participation in the Nord Stream explosions is nonsense,” Zelensky's adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said, denying the American newspaper's reports.

The report, titled “A Drunk Night on a Charter Yacht: The True Story of the Nord Stream Gas Pipeline Sabotage”is published a day after it became known that Germany had issued an arrest warrant for a Ukrainian citizen living in Poland for his alleged connection to the sabotage of the gas pipeline through which Russia transported gas to Germany via the Baltic.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the attack, which it called one of the “most audacious” sabotage actions in modern history, was organized during a meeting of “a handful of senior Ukrainian military officers and businessmen” to “provide credit for his country's remarkable success in stopping Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.”

“Encouraged by alcohol and patriotic fervor, someone suggested a radical next step: destroying Nord Stream,” the report said, noting that there was speculation that U.S. intelligence was behind the pipeline explosion using three underwater blasts, a theory supported by Russia and even by Russian President Vladimir Putin himself.

The “real story,” according to the WSJ, is that private businessmen financed the operation carried out by a group of six people who were sailing aboard the Andromeda, a 15-meter pleasure yacht that they had chartered in Germany. Among them were four civilian divers and a woman, “whose presence helped create the illusion that they were a group of friends on a pleasure cruise,” the report said.

The plan cost about $300,000 and was overseen by an acting general with special operations experience who reported to the then-commander in chief of the Ukrainian armed forces, Gen. Valeriy Zaluzhniy, according to the WSJ investigation, which spoke to one of the participants and three people most familiar with the operation, among other sources.

“The CIA warned Zelensky’s office to end the operation, U.S. officials said. The Ukrainian president then ordered Zaluzhniy to detain her, according to Ukrainian officials and officials familiar with the conversation, as well as Western intelligence officials. But the general ignored the order and his team changed the original plan, these people said.

The Wall Street Journal points out that to corroborate this information, he exchanged messages with Zaluzhniy, now the Ukrainian ambassador to the United Kingdom, and also spoke with a senior official of the Ukrainian intelligence service (SBU). Both denied the veracity of the information.

Zelensky “did not approve the implementation of such actions on the territory of third countries and did not issue relevant orders,” the Ukrainian intelligence source consulted by the WSJ stressed.

The newspaper says that the sabotage participants' account was partly corroborated by a nearly two-year German police investigation, during which – it specifies – “President Zelensky was not directly linked to the clandestine operation.”

The WSJ identifies one of those recruited for the operation as Roman Chervinsky, a decorated colonel who previously served in Ukraine's main security and intelligence service, the SBU, and who is currently on trial in Ukraine on unrelated charges.

In July, the newspaper added, he was released on bail after more than a year in detention and, when contacted, he declined to comment on the Nord Stream affair, saying he was not authorised.

In addition to what was published by the American newspaper, the results of an investigation into the attack on Nord Stream conducted by the German public television channel ARD, the newspaper 'Süddeutsche Zeitung' and the weekly 'Die Zeit' were announced on Wednesday.

According to the investigation, Germany issued an arrest order for a diving instructor identified as “Vladímir S.”, but the order was not executed by Poland, although Warsaw and Berlin are discussing the future of the suspect.

“Vladimir S.” and two other Ukrainian citizens, who are in charge of a diving school and identified as “Ewgen U.” and “his wife Svetlana” are allegedly involved in the sabotage, according to the investigation conducted by these media outlets.

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