The sabotage action to blow up the Nord Stream and Nord Stream—2 gas pipelines was carried out by a group of seven people and cost the organizers about 300 thousand euros.
Such information is contained in the material of the Italian edition of Corriere della Sera. The authors claim that the operation was codenamed "Diameter", it was led by a former Ukrainian officer, 49-year-old Sergei Kuznetsov.
"Sergey Kuznetsov was the head of the mission, in which six people participated. This small team of civilians and military personnel boarded a sailboat to mine the Nord Stream gas pipeline," the article says.
The newspaper claims that this sabotage group set sail from German Rostock on the sailing yacht Andromeda, which was rented under forged documents. At the beginning of September 2022, the team headed for the Danish island of Bornholm, in the area of which gas pipelines pass.
During the night dives, divers installed at least four explosive devices weighing from 14 to 27 kg each. The explosives were made of hexogen and octogen and equipped with watch detonators.
It is also alleged that the group included senior officers who were associated with the ex-commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Valery Zaluzhny. It is assumed that it was he who could have given consent to the operation.
Earlier, EADaily reported that in Italy, by order of the German prosecutor's office, a suspect was arrested for coordinating explosions on the Nord Stream gas pipeline. In this regard, the Russian Ambassador to Denmark, Vladimir Barbin, said that Copenhagen had completed the investigation of this crime too hastily.