MOSCOW, October 30. /TASS/. The claim that Ukrainian divers were responsible for the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines is "nothing but nonsense," Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico stated during the "60 Minutes" program on the Rossiya-1 TV channel.
"We read reports suggesting that some intoxicated Ukrainian officers claimed they were going to blow them up (the pipelines - TASS). I’m exaggerating a bit, but just imagine: they use a small boat to reach the pipeline, dive down several hundred meters with sparklers and pyrotechnics, and manage to blow the whole thing up. This is nonsense," he said.
On August 14, the Suddeutsche Zeitung reported that German prosecutors had issued an arrest warrant for a Ukrainian diving instructor who may be involved in the Nord Stream sabotage. The report indicated that two other Ukrainian diving instructors might also be implicated. German prosecutors also emphasized that Poland is not cooperating with them. According to them, Poland "was not willing to cooperate from the very beginning."
On September 27, 2022, Nord Stream AG reported "unprecedented damage" on three strings of the offshore gas pipelines of the Nord Stream system. Later, Swedish seismologists said they had identified two explosions on the route of the Nord Stream pipelines on September 26, 2022. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at that time that Moscow had no doubt that the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines was carried out with US support. Following the incident, the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office initiated a criminal case on charges of international terrorism.