HAMBURG, October 14. /TASS/. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was aware of the plan to sabotage the Nord Stream and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines and had nothing against it, German investigative journalist Oliver Schrom told the NTV television channel.

"According to our sources, the CIA knew [of the sabotage plans] at an early stage. Its officers on the ground initially had no objections to the plan, and they even admitted financial participation," said the journalist who co-authored a book dedicated to the attack on the pipelines with Ulrich Thiele. The Americans’ position changed after Dutch intelligence learned of the plans, he noted.

"However, according to our sources, the CIA men never told the organizers with such great emphasis to drop it," the journalist said, adding that there was no fundamental objection from the CIA "at the working level," though responsibility for an operation of such scale could not have rested with the staff on the ground.

"When the organizers decided to blow up the pipelines, they turned to their American contacts," he said.

The first trial against a suspected perpetrator of the Nord Stream explosions, Ukrainian citizen Sergey K., begins in Hamburg on Wednesday. Sergey K. is suspected 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 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.

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.