German investigators believe the group of Ukrainians who allegedly blew up the gas pipelines Nord Stream in the Baltic Sea it acted under the leadership of the then Chief of its Armed Forces Ukrainian and the country’s ambassador to Britain from 2024, Valery Zaluzny.
The publication says German police, prosecutors and others familiar with the Nord Stream case have developed what they claim is “a clear picture of how an elite Ukrainian military unit carried out the attacks under the direct leadership of then-Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, General Valery Zaluzny.”
According to them, the aim of the saboteurs was to reduce Russia’s oil revenues and its economic ties with Germany.
The decisive piece of evidence was a black-and-white photograph taken by a German speed radar. It showed the face of a Ukrainian deep-sea diver, whom the police identified and located in Poland. The Ukrainian diver was later taken to Ukraine in a car with diplomatic plates, reportedly driven by the Ukrainian military attaché in Warsaw.
At the same time, the commander of the Ukrainian sabotage unit, Serhiy K., was found in Italy and linked to the Ukrainian intelligence service (SBU) and therefore was arrested in August on the basis of a European arrest warrant.
Suspect Serhiy K.’s deplorable detention conditions that led him to go on hunger strike
Serhiy K., the Ukrainian who is also suspected of coordinating the gas pipeline sabotage operation, he has even started a hunger strike because he believes that the Italian authorities are violating his fundamental rights by ignoring her his poor healthhis lawyer said today.
Bureaucratic obstacles and prison regulations forced the suspect to not receive food suitable for his condition, his lawyer, Nicola Canestrini, told Reuters, causing him to lose a lot of weight.
Canestrini stated that in September his client denied any involvement in the attacks. Last month, an Italian appeals court in Bologna ordered that the suspect be transferred to Germany. The Ukrainian ex-officer is currently being held in a maximum security Italian prison pending a hearing at the Court of Cassation, which is expected to take place in about a month.
“S.K he refuses to eat for 10 days now, due to his health condition and has already lost nine kilograms,” his lawyer said, adding that this raised “serious concerns about respect for international humanitarian law”.
He even stated that his client suffered from pancreatitis from celiac diseasean autoimmune condition caused by certain foods, as she is vegan.
“Furthermore, he is a non-smoker and has been forced to share a cell for two and a half months with other prisoners who smoke 24 hours a day,” he added.
Dmytro Lubinets, the Ukrainian parliament’s human rights commissioner, said on Sunday that he called on the Italian authorities to respect the suspect’s rights to adequate food and a healthy detention environment.
No one has claimed responsibility for the 2022 eruptionswhich both Moscow and the West characterize as an act of sabotage. Ukraine denies any involvement.
Source: OnAlert / APE-MPE