The President’s Office of Ukraine states that Ukraine had no motive to blow up the Russian Nord Stream gas pipe near the coasts of Denmark and Sweden, while it was Russia who had an obvious motive.

"Did Ukraine have motives? Of course, it did not. Firstly, it would not have reduced the resource capabilities of Russia. Second, it would not have required Russia to withdraw its troops from Ukrainian territory. And it would definitely not have changed the course of the war. Instead, if Ukraine had done something like this back then, it would have resulted in a massive information attack against us and the European communities. This could have made everything harder for us as our partners would have been disappointed," Interfax-Ukraine quotes Mykhailo Podoliak, advisor to the head of the President’s Office of Ukraine, who said this on the air during the national joint 24/7 newscast on Wednesday, 8 March.

Herewith, Podoliak believes Russia has an obvious motive for the blowing up the Nord Stream gas pipelines.

"Just remember the frantic pace at which the price of a thousand cubic metres of Russian gas was growing. Russia was constantly provoking breakdowns and accidents at the Nord Stream-1 in order not to fulfil its obligations under the contracts. The Russian media was constantly publishing material about ‘the end of Europe’. It was an element of pressure…

In order to put pressure on them (the Western allies of Ukraine – ed.) and weaken the support of Ukraine, Russia conducted all these campaigns. When it did not manage to blackmail Ukraine and its allies with conversations and propaganda, an explosion occurred. The motive is clear," Podoliak said.

Podoliak added that the explosion at the Nord Stream gas pipelines occurred after the effective counter-offensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in Kharkiv Oblast and a corresponding increase in the Western military aid for Ukraine.

In addition to this, there is a very close coordination between the Ukrainian intelligence and the intelligence of its partners; therefore, it is impossible for the intelligence services of the partner states not to know about Ukraine’s preparation for some large-scale action.

"Our intelligence services communicate with one another in many directions. It is impossible for them to miss the signs of preparation for some large-scale actions. This (the blowing up of the Nord Stream gas pipelines – ed.) is one of those large-scale actions that could have changed the course of the war if the accents had been wrong," he said.

Podoliak also pointed out that The New York Times article only provides links to anonymous sources, does not analyse the motives, and uses the phrase "pro-Ukrainian group" with no specification about the members of the group, their goals, etc.

"In order to analyse this or that incident, you have to understand the motives of the parties involved – their objectives, their possible benefit, etc," Podoliak added,

On 7 March, an authoritative American liberal media outlet, The New York Times, published an article referring to sources and the intelligence community that tend to believe that non-governmental groups that could have Russians and Ukrainians as members could be responsible for the explosions at the Nord Stream gas pipes in the Baltic Sea.

According to the German media, the investigation in Germany found the vessel that was used to conduct the sabotage operation at the Russian Nord Stream gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea in the autumn of 2022. The investigation believes that this vessel is somehow connected to Ukraine.

Mykhailo Podoliak, advisor to the head of the President’s Office of Ukraine, stated that Ukraine is not responsible for the explosions at the Russian Nord Stream gas pipelines, and it has no information concerning some pro-Ukrainian agents who could have been involved.

Germany and the US called to wait for the official results of the investigation of the incident at Nord Stream gas pipelines before talking about the alleged involvement of certain parties.

Meanwhile, Putin’s administration called the articles about the "Ukrainian trace" in the organisation of the explosions at the Nord Stream gas pipelines "coordinated fake-news".