The White House denies US involvement in the explosions at the Nord Stream pipeline.
Recent claims that the US was responsible for the explosions of the Nord Stream gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea have been vigorously refuted by the White House. Seymour Hersh, a US investigative journalist, said in a blog post that President Joe Biden had authorized an attack on the pipelines in September of last year.
White House official statement
The White House National Security Council’s Adrienne Watson described Hersh’s claims as “utterly inaccurate and total fabrication” in a statement. Reuters was unable to independently confirm the information.
Sweden and Denmark’s Exclusive Economic Zones had explosions
Sweden and Denmark have looked at the pipelines, which are multibillion dollar infrastructure initiatives intended to deliver Russian gas to Germany. Although both countries have concluded that the explosions were purposeful, neither has blamed any one party for the disaster.
Russia asks the US to explain
The foreign ministry of Russia has also commented on the situation, saying that the US has to provide answers on its role in the explosions. Despite being finished in September 2021, the Nord Stream 2 project, which was intended to quadruple the quantity of gas Russia could export to Germany directly, never went into service since Berlin halted certification only days before Moscow deployed soldiers into Ukraine in February of that same year.
History of Seymour Hersh
Veteran US investigative journalist Seymour Hersh has received several honors for his work, which includes articles on the Vietnam War and the 2004 Abu Ghraib crisis following the US invasion of Iraq. Hersh has garnered media attention recently for his disputed allegations of the death of Osama bin Laden, the founder of al Qaeda, and an alleged use of sarin nerve agents by Syrian rebels in a suburb of Damascus that killed hundreds of civilians.