Berlin Not Excluding Possibility That West Could Scapegoat Russia for Nord Stream, Media Reports

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - German investigators are studying the attack on the Nord Stream gas pipeline and do not exclude the possibility that the explosion could have been carried out by a Western state in order to scapegoat Russia, a British newspaper reported on Thursday.

Explosions occurred on September 26 at three of the four strings of Nord Stream 1 and 2 underwater pipelines with capacity to carry a combined annual 110 billion cubic meters of Russian gas to Europe. The incident halted gas deliveries to Germany ahead of the cold season, prompting a gas price hike.

Germany, Denmark and Sweden all launched separate investigations into the incident, with the Swedish Security Service confirming “gross sabotage”.

The Russian Prosecutor General's Office is investigating the pipeline incidents as acts of international terrorism.

As Denmark and Sweden barred Russia from investigating the incidents, the Russian Foreign Ministry made clear that the investigation can only be considered reliable and objective if Moscow participates in it.

After a month-long investigation, the Russian Ministry of Defense revealed in late October that Britain’s Royal Navy took part in the planning, organization and execution of the Nord Stream attack.

Spokeswoman of Russia's Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, said the world needed to know more about a text message allegedly sent by former UK Prime Minister Liz Truss to US State Secretary Antony Blinken minutes after the targeting of the Nord Stream pipeline network. Earlier, Kim Dotcom, the founder of Megaupload file-sharing website, tweeted that Truss had ostensibly used her iPhone to send a message to Blinken saying "It’s done" just minutes after the pipeline explosion. According to the entrepreneur, the text Truss sent is well known to the intelligence service of Russia and is the reason Moscow believes that the United Kingdom was involved in the bombing attack.