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In the focus of the Federal Prosecutor General: The Stralsund Mining Authority
Photo: Stefan Sauer / dpa
According to a media report, the Federal Prosecutor General is examining whether state secrets were disclosed by the Stralsund Mining Authority in the Nord Stream 2 proceedings. The authority was involved in the planning process for the now destroyed gas pipeline and published sensitive military data on its homepage. This had already become known at the beginning of December 2023 in the investigative committee for the Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania Climate Foundation.
Specifically, it was about a classified report that contained military data on NATO submarines, ammunition and specific information on the number of shots fired during military exercises. The mining authority received it from the Bundeswehr. Although the authority had to promise in writing not to publish this data, parts of it appeared on the mining authority's homepage at the beginning of 2018 in the planning process for Nord Stream 2. It was said at the time that this happened accidentally.
According to "Bild am Sonntag", the Federal Prosecutor General is now examining the initial suspicion of revealing state secrets against employees of the Stralsund Mining Authority. The newspaper cites a confidential report from the Defense Ministry to the Chancellery and the Bundestag from the end of January.
Conclusions about “military operational options”
The leak was noticed by the Bundeswehr itself, which contacted the mining authority. According to the newspaper, members of the Bundeswehr discovered the number of shots fired by the German Navy on page 556 of the planning approval decision for Nord Stream 2 published on the Internet by the mining authority. It is feared that this information could allow conclusions to be drawn about “military operational options.”
The corresponding Bundeswehr report from which these figures came is classified as “VS-NfD”, as “classified information – for official use only”. This is the lowest of four levels of secrecy for authorities.
Nord Stream 2 had caused controversy for years: Germany, together with Russia, pushed ahead with construction despite the annexation of the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, which violated international law - against strong protests from the USA and Eastern and Central European states such as Poland and Ukraine. In September 2022 - in the midst of geopolitical tensions surrounding Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the gas crisis in Germany and Europe - explosions tore several holes in the Nord Stream 1 and 2 natural gas pipelines laid at the bottom of the Baltic Sea. This was presumably a case of sabotage , but the background is still unclear.
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