Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the US is looking for ways to take control of the Nord Stream gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea, Reuters reports.
The pipelines were damaged in an explosion in September 2022, cutting off Russian natural gas supplies to Europe, although they had already been largely cut off.
Both Russia and the West have said the explosion was sabotage. It took investigators several years to determine who was responsible for damaging the Nord Stream pipelines, and last year a Ukrainian citizen was detained in Italy on suspicion of orchestrating the attack.
Speaking to France Televisions on the 26th of March,
Lavrov said the US was seeking dominance in the international energy market,
and cited Venezuela, where the US has taken control of the world’s largest oil reserves, as well as Iran. According to the text of the interview released by the Russian Foreign Ministry, Lavrov said that the Americans are now saying they want to take over the Nord Stream pipelines. However, he did not provide further details.
The Wall Street Journal reported in 2024 on plans by American investor Stephen P. Lynch to buy the Nord Stream pipelines.
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