BERLIN, September 3. /TASS/. The trial for suspected Nord Stream bomber and Ukrainian citizen Sergey K. will begin on October 14, the Higher Regional Court of Hamburg said.

The State Security Senate of the Hanseatic Higher Regional Court has accepted the charges against Ukrainian citizen Sergey K. and allowed the case to proceed to trial. The court found sufficient evidence to suspect Sergey K. of a war crime involving prohibited methods of warfare, including attacks on civilian objects, carrying out an explosion, destruction of structures and disruption of public utilities.

The court has scheduled 16 hearings, beginning on October 14 and continuing through December 17. Additional hearings are scheduled for January and February, but the dates have yet to be finalized.

The German Federal Prosecutor General’s Office believes that Sergey K., whom German media have identified as the head of the sabotage group, and his accomplices planned the pipeline blasts on orders from Ukrainian government agencies. Another Ukrainian national was recently detained in Croatia and is expected to be extradited to Germany. Investigators believe the saboteurs used forged documents to rent a sailing yacht from a German company and transported explosives to the Nord Stream pipelines aboard the vessel.

On September 26, 2022, unprecedented damage was recorded on three strings of the Nord Stream pipelines and the never-commissioned Nord Stream 2 pipeline. The Russian Prosecutor General’s Office opened a criminal case over an act of international terrorism.