Director of the Serbian Military Security Service Duro Jovanic informed that a foreign citizen planned to carry out an explosive sabotage targeting the gas pipeline connecting Serbia and Hungary.
“We have received information that a member of a group of enlistment-age migrants tried to sabotage gas infrastructure,” he said.
He did not specify the motive of the sabotage plot as well as the nationality of the suspect. According to Mr. Jovanic, the suspect "will definitely be arrested".
The head of the Serbian military counterintelligence agency also emphasized that the explosive detection operation was carried out after "effective field reconnaissance and sharing useful information with other intelligence agencies".
He noted that the symbols on the explosives show that they were manufactured in the US.
Previously, the Serbian Ministry of Defense announced the discovery of an explosives depot near the gas pipeline connecting Serbia and Hungary.
The incident was classified as a sabotage plot. About 140 police and soldiers participated in the search operation.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said that backpacks containing 2 large packages of explosives with detonators were found in Kanjiza, northern Serbia, a few hundred meters from the pipeline.
On the Hungarian side, Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto declared that Budapest considers this an act of attack on national sovereignty, because this route transports most of the imported gas from Russia.
Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto compared the discovery of backpacks containing explosives near the gas pipeline in Serbia to the attack on the Nord Stream pipeline connecting Russia and Germany across the Baltic Sea in 2022.
On April 6, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban met with military forces along the border with Serbia, one day after discovering a plot to sabotage the TurkStream gas pipeline.
Mr. Orban called TurkStream Hungary's lifeline and praised Serbia for discovering explosives near this pipeline on April 5.
If the pipeline is cut, the Hungarian economy will stagnate and hundreds of thousands of Hungarian families will have no gas. That is why what happened on Serbian territory is very serious. I want to thank Serbia for its quick and effective action. They prevented a major disaster from happening," Mr. Orban said.
Unlike European countries, both Serbia and Hungary are still heavily dependent on Russia's energy supply. Hungary receives gas from Russia through the TurkStream pipeline, connecting Russia and Turkey through the Black Sea, then through Bulgaria (an EU member state), passing through Serbia and into Hungary.
Last month, Serbia secured an additional 3 months of gas imports from Russia after negotiations between President Vucic and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
