Ministers rubbish Russian claims Britain was behind Nord Stream attack
The Russian defence ministry has accused the British navy of attacking and rupturing the Nord Stream gas pipelines last month, a claim that British ministers described as an attempt to divert attention away from military failures in Ukraine.
In unsubstantiated claims, the Russian ministry claimed that “British specialists” were behind the attack which led to a major leakage on the pipelines in the Baltic Sea.
“According to available information, representatives of this unit of the British Navy took part in the planning, provision and implementation of a terrorist attack in the Baltic Sea on September 26 this year – blowing up the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines,” the ministry said.
Russian ministers claimed that military personnel from the same unit were responsible for Ukrainian drone attacks on ships of Russian Black Sea fleet in Crimea earlier on Saturday, that it said were largely repelled by Russian forces.
The British government immediately rebuffed the claims today and said they were an attempt to divert attention away the Russian failures of the war in Ukraine.
“To detract from their disastrous handling of the illegal invasion of Ukraine, the Russian Ministry of Defence is resorting to peddling false claims of an epic scale,” it said.
“This invented story, says more about arguments going on inside the Russian government than it does about the West.”
Russia has previously blamed the West for the attack that ruptured the Russian-built Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines on the bed of the Baltic Sea.