MINSK, May 14. /TASS/. All the members of the group of Ukrainians who took part in the cover-up of the sabotage on the Nord Stream gas pipelines have been identified, Andrey Derkach, a Ukrainian politician and activist, said.

In an interview with BelTA released on the news agency’s YouTube channel, he recalled that the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office had earlier forwarded Russian lawmakers’ requests and addresses to the United States, Germany, France and Cyprus regarding the blowing-up of the Nord Stream and Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipelines.

"We have identified almost every member of the group" of saboteurs, Derkach said as he pointed to, among other people, Roman Chervinsky, whom The Washington Post earlier described as the coordinator of the explosions, and Marina Sitalo, 50, who Derkach called one of Ukraine’s best commercial divers and an "interesting person."

According to the politician, members of the group led by Chervinsky, who had been issued Romanian passports, acted under instructions from Christopher Smith, "the No.2 at the US Embassy in Ukraine at that time and a well-known" CIA agent. He currently serves as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Eastern Europe (EE) and Policy and Regional Affairs (PRA) in the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs. "He maintained a very good personal relationship with former chief of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s GUR (Main Intelligence Directorate - TASS) [Vasily] Burba. Actually, [current GUR head] Kirill Budanov is his student," Derkach explained.

He described the cover-up story as very well thought out. "The experience of the CIA or MI-6 in prepping such operations cannot be underestimated," he concluded.