READ MORE:<\/strong> Russian barrage causes blackouts in Ukraine as Zelenskyy seeks Trump\u2019s help<\/a><\/p>\nThe Warsaw District Court rejected his extradition on Friday and ordered his immediate release.
The man\u2019s lawyer, Tymoteusz Paprocki, said ahead of the hearing that \u201cmy client doesn\u2019t admit guilt, he didn\u2019t commit any crime against Germany and he doesn\u2019t understand why these charges were made by the German side.\u201d He said he also would argue that no Ukrainian should be charged with any action directed against Russia.<\/p>\n
Judge points to a \u201cjust war\u201d<\/p>\n
Judge Dariusz Lubowski said as he announced his ruling that the attack on the pipelines should be understood as a military action in a \u201cjust war,\u201d and therefore not subject to criminal responsibility on the part of an individual. He also questioned German jurisdiction for various reasons, including the fact that the explosions occurred in international waters.<\/p>\n
Poland, whose successive governments have been staunchly anti-Russian, has a history of opposition to the pipelines. Prime Minister Donald Tusk has said it would not be in Poland\u2019s interest to hand over the suspect.<\/p>\n
Tusk noted in a post on X Friday that the court had rejected extradition, \u201cand rightly so.\u201d He added that \u201cthe case is closed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pipelines drew regional opposition<\/p>\n
Undersea explosions on Sept. 26, 2022, severely damaged the pipelines. The damage added to tensions over the war in Ukraine as European countries moved to wean themselves off Russian energy sources, following the Kremlin\u2019s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.<\/p>\n
The explosions ruptured the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, which was inaugurated in 2011 and carried Russian natural gas to Germany under the Baltic Sea until Russia cut off supplies at the end of August 2022.<\/p>\n
They also damaged the parallel Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which never entered service because Germany suspended its certification process shortly before Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.<\/p>\n
Germany had previously pushed ahead with the Nord Stream 2 project despite opposition from central and eastern European countries and the U.S., which argued it would increase Europe\u2019s dependence on Russian gas and give Russia the possibility of using gas as a geopolitical weapon.<\/p>\n
Tusk said earlier this month that \u201cthe problem of Europe, the problem of Ukraine, the problem of Lithuania and Poland is not that Nord Stream 2 was blown up, but that it was built.\u201d He said that \u201cthe only people who should be ashamed of and quiet about Nord Stream 2 are those who decided to build it.\u201d<\/p>\n
German prosecutors also seeking an extradition from Italy<\/p>\n
At the time of his arrest, Zhuravlov was a resident of Poland, where he lived with his wife and children, Polish prosecutors say. His wife has told Polish media her husband is innocent and that they were together in Poland at the time the pipelines were blown up.<\/p>\n
He is one of two Ukrainians whose extradition German judicial authorities have been trying to secure in the case.<\/p>\n
A man suspected to have been one of the coordinators of the attack was arrested in Italy in August. This week, Italy\u2019s top court annulled a lower court\u2019s decision to order his extradition and called for another panel of judges to reassess the case, his lawyer said.<\/p>\n
The German government has declined to comment on Tusk\u2019s remarks this month, and has noted that the ongoing proceedings are in prosecutors\u2019 hands. Neither the government nor German federal prosecutors, who are in charge of the case, had any comment on Friday\u2019s ruling.<\/p>\n
Geir Moulson in Berlin contributed to this report.<\/p>\n
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