Swedish police claims Nord Stream inquiry discovers detonations

• A crime scene investigation of the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines from Russia to Europe has made it more likely that there was “gross sabotage” with explosions.
• Moscow is trying to blame the West for the damage, suggesting that the United States stood to gain.
• The area where gas leaked into the sea for almost a week is no longer blocked off, prosecutors say.

Sweden’s Security Service said on Thursday that a crime scene investigation of the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines from Russia to Europe has made it more likely that there was “gross sabotage” with explosions.

Since the beginning of last week, when they were first noticed, Swedish and Danish authorities have been looking into four leaks from pipelines in their exclusive economic zones in the Baltic Sea.

As a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Europe is facing an energy crisis. Moscow is trying to blame the West for the damage, suggesting that the United States stood to gain.

Washington says it has nothing to do with the standoff between Russia and European countries over gas supplies that have been stopped or put on hold because of the conflict in Ukraine.

This week, the people who run Nord Stream said that they couldn’t look at the damaged parts because Danish and Swedish authorities had put up barriers around the area.

“After finishing its investigation of the crime scene, the Swedish Security Service can say that there were explosions at Nord Stream 1 and 2 in the Swedish economic zone,” the agency said in a statement.

The security service said that there was a lot of damage to the gas pipelines and that they had taken some things from the site to look at. They said that the evidence “has made the suspicions of gross sabotage even stronger.”

In a separate statement, Sweden’s Prosecution Authority said that the area where gas leaked into the sea for almost a week was no longer blocked off.

Russia said Thursday that it had been told through diplomatic channels that it couldn’t help with the investigation.

“As of right now, there are no plans to ask the Russian side to join investigations,” Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for the Kremlin, told reporters. Moscow replied that an investigation could not be fair without its help.

On Monday, Swedish prosecutors blocked off the area of the leaks so that the Swedish Coast Guard and Navy could investigate it as a crime scene.

Wednesday, Sweden’s justice minister told the Kremlin that other people couldn’t help with a criminal investigation in Sweden.

Jeppe Kofod, the foreign minister of Denmark, told Reuters on Thursday that his government had not told Russia to stay out of the investigation, but that the investigation was being led by a police task force made up of Denmark, Sweden, and Germany.

Maria Zakharova, a spokeswoman for Russia’s foreign ministry, said separately on Thursday that Moscow would demand a “comprehensive and open investigation” that includes Russian officials and Gazprom.

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