EILMELDUNG: "Ich weiß, wer Nord Stream gesprengt hat"

Summary

The interview with investigative journalist Oliver Schröm ranges across the Nord Stream explosions, Cum-Ex tax fraud, corruption in cancer-drug supply, and the pressures facing investigative reporters.

Nord Stream: Schröm’s account

Schröm says his and co-author Ulrich Thiele’s research leads him to conclude that Ukrainians carried out the Nord Stream attack. He describes the alleged planners as former Ukrainian intelligence officers, including Roman Chervinsky and a former intelligence chief referred to in the subtitles as Burba. According to Schröm, they contacted Ukraine’s military leadership, but the operation was not authorized by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He says the military commander gave them no practical support, so they recruited civilian divers and organized the mission themselves.

Schröm says the suspected crew and their boat have been identified, and that evidence includes traces of explosives associated with the vessel. He also says he and Thiele spoke with people in the alleged planners’ circle. However, he stresses that the evidence does not establish that Zelenskyy knew of or approved the operation. He criticizes a Wall Street Journal account that implicated Zelenskyy, arguing that such a serious allegation requires specific evidence, not just anonymous sources.

The interview emphasizes that the legal and political meaning of the attack remains disputed. Ukraine’s alleged planners reportedly viewed the pipelines as Russian state-linked infrastructure financing the war and therefore a legitimate target. German prosecutors, by contrast, treat the attack as a crime against civilian infrastructure and potentially a war crime. The trial of a suspect extradited to Germany is presented as an important test, though Schröm cautions that a court’s verdict will not necessarily settle every historical question.

Schröm also recounts the political context: Germany’s reliance on Russian gas, Ukraine’s opposition to Nord Stream because it bypassed its territory, and U.S. opposition to the pipeline. He says U.S. and British officials warned German leaders in 2021 that Russia was preparing to invade Ukraine, while German leaders were initially skeptical. He reports a separate allegation—relayed by a European prime minister—that Scholz and Macron urged Zelenskyy to consider surrendering. Scholz denied it, and Schröm says the denial was included in the book.

Investigative journalism and uncertainty

Schröm describes investigative work as assembling and checking large numbers of fragments: documents, interviews, diaries, public records, and other sources. Sources may have mixed motives, he says, so journalists must test claims and seek the complete context.

He rejects the idea that reporters can always establish absolute truth, particularly when intelligence agencies may be involved. His standard is to get as close to the truth as possible, clearly distinguish what is known from what remains uncertain, and avoid presenting allegations as proven facts.

He also discusses the risks of the profession. In Germany, he says, journalists are more commonly pressured through expensive lawsuits and economic strain than physical violence. Legal scrutiny is legitimate when reporting makes serious allegations, but it can also be used to exhaust journalists and publishers.

Earlier investigations

Schröm recalls reporting on Cum-Ex, a tax-trading scheme that he says ultimately caused roughly €50 billion in losses across about ten European countries. He describes an undercover operation in London in which he and a colleague posed as wealthy investors to document that Cum-Ex deals were still being offered after politicians had suggested the practice had ended.

He also discusses his reporting on alleged corruption in cancer-drug supply. He says pharmacists bribed doctors to steer lucrative prescriptions to particular pharmacies, describing the problem as systemic rather than merely a matter of a few “bad apples.” A book he co-wrote on the subject was effectively removed from sale after legal pressure and the publisher’s financial difficulties. Schröm notes the irony that a pharmacist who had helped block the book was later sentenced to three and a half years in prison.

The conversation also covers a Bottrop pharmacist who was convicted of fraud after patients received cancer infusions with no active ingredient or insufficient doses. Schröm says prosecutors could not prove that the patients’ deaths resulted directly from the missing medication, so the case was not prosecuted as murder.

Presenters and contributors

• Ben — host
• Oliver Schröm — guest, investigative journalist
• Ulrich Thiele — Schröm’s co-author and research collaborator on Nord Stream-related work