The Ukrainian Military Prosecutor's Office has launched a criminal investigation on negligence charges following the explosions at military depots near Balaklia in the Kharkiv region, Ukrainian Chief Military Prosecutor Anatoliy Matios said.

"A group comprising prosecutors and investigators of the Chief Military Prosecutor's Office and the main investigative department of the SBU [Security Service of Ukraine] has been dispatched to the scene in order to organize and conduct a criminal investigation registered under Ukrainian Criminal Code Article 113, which qualifies these actions and events as an act of sabotage. In addition to that, the Military Prosecutor's Office has registered a criminal inquiry opened under Ukrainian Criminal Code Article 425, Part 3, namely negligence on the part of servicemen entailing grave consequences," Matios said at a press briefing in Kyiv on Thursday.

The sabotage probe has been opened by the SBU and the negligence case by the prosecution service, but these two cases have already been merged into one investigation procedurally overseen by the Chief Military Prosecutor's Office, he said.