CIA warned Ukraine not to blow up Nord Stream, reports say – POLITICO

The CIA warned Ukraine not to destroy Nord Stream months before an attack on the gas pipelines, after receiving a tip from Dutch military intelligence, according to media reports.

The Netherlands’ military intelligence agency, MIVD, received information about an “imminent attack” on Nord Stream from an unnamed source in Ukraine in June, three months before a series of underwater explosions hit the pipes last September, a joint investigation by Dutch and German news outlets published Tuesday shows.

According to the plan received by MIVD, the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, General Valery Zaluzhny, was in charge of the operation against Nord Stream, which involved a small team of divers traveling on a sailing boat and was supposed to take place mid-June 2022.

The Dutch intelligence services then informed the U.S., who made contact with Ukraine via the CIA to warn them off, the reports say.

The Dutch government and MIVD declined to comment to NOS, Die Zeit and ARD on their joint reporting.

Last September, the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines, linking Russia to Germany through the Baltic Sea, were targeted by two blasts in what has been called an act of deliberate sabotage by Swedish and Danish authorities.

Although fingers were quickly pointed at Russia for the bombing, the culprit has not yet been identified.

In a recent interview with Axel Springer, POLITICO’s parent company, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy denied any involvement in the attack.

“I am president and I give orders accordingly,” Zelenskyy said. “Nothing of the sort has been done by Ukraine. I would never act that way.”