MOSCOW, February 22. /TASS/. Russia will continue to work to prevent the collective West from hushing up the search for those responsible for the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with reporters on Wednesday.

He was commenting on the results of a meeting of the UN Security Council on the topic of gas pipeline explosions.

"On the one hand, we managed to draw attention to the need for a thorough and transparent investigation to confirm those suspicions, which are supported, by the way, by some quite detailed, surprisingly, investigations regarding who could be behind this sabotage, and this can and should be characterized as a terrorist act against critical energy infrastructure for the European continent," Peskov said.

He also added that "on the other hand, we come up against a brick wall of unwillingness to do this, on the part of the countries of the collective West, and, on the contrary, we see their desire not to focus too much on this issue and gradually ensure that this topic is swept under the rug."

"We will continue to work to prevent them from doing so," the spokesman concluded.

He stressed that the refusal to give Moscow access to the investigation of the Nord Stream explosions hampers the search for the truth.

"Here we are limited in our capabilities. Obviously, it concerns the territorial waters of other states, which are currently categorically denying Russia’s right to take part in the investigation or conduct its own [investigation] in their territorial waters. We regard this as a very negative manifestation that does not contribute to the search for truth and identifying those who are guilty of this terrorist act. But, of course, Russia will continue to do everything possible," Peskov summed up.

About sabotage on Nord Stream pipelines

On September 27, 2022, Nord Stream AG reported unprecedented damage that occurred the day before on three strings of the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 offshore gas pipelines. On September 26, 2022, Swedish seismologists registered two explosions on the pipeline routes. The Russian Prosecutor General's Office launched a criminal case based on charges of international terrorism.

On February 8, US investigative journalist Seymour Hersh published an article, which said, citing sources, that US Navy divers had planted explosive devices under the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines under the cover of the BALTOPS exercise in June 2022, and Norwegians activated the bombs three months later. According to the journalist, the decision to conduct the operation was made by US President Joe Biden personally, following nine months of discussions with White House security specialists. White House National Security Council Spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a comment to TASS that Hersh’s account was "utterly false and complete fiction.".