Statement by Permanent Representative Vassily Nebenzia at UNSC briefing on the terrorist attack against the Nord Stream gas pipeline
Mr.President,
We thank ASG Jenča and Ms. Niyazberdiyeva for their briefings. We are grateful to Mr. Larry Johnson, the American political observer, for his comprehensive presentation.
Mr. Johnson, who has extensive experience in the area of counter-terrorism, including in United States Government agencies, has clearly demonstrated the ridiculousness and absurdity of attempts by the United States authorities and their allies to turn a blind eye to and divert the attention of the international community from the terrorist attack on the Nord Stream gas pipes. Even American citizens can hardly conceal their indignation at such actions by Washington.
Mr.President,
It’s been more than 18 months since the blasts at the two threads of the Nord Stream pipeline in the Baltic Sea. Over that time, the Security Council has discussed this situation about ten times, both in open and closed formats. All members of the Security Council have condemned the deliberate destruction of a major cross-border submarine infrastructure facility. This event undoubtedly constituted a direct threat to international peace and security. The use of explosive devices against a seabed gas infrastructure worth some $17 billion caused critical damage to the pipeline, had serious environmental effects and posed a clear danger to navigation in that part of the Baltic Sea.
Given the gravity of the crime, many of our Security Council colleagues were hopeful about the results of the national investigations that Germany, Denmark and Sweden launched right after the attack. We immediately expressed skepticism about this, based on the fact that Berlin, Copenhagen and Stockholm refused to cooperate with Russia as an interested party. Our doubts were reinforced when these countries flatly refused to appear before the Security Council and report on their efforts, having confined themselves to circulating empty and vague letters. Nevertheless, their allies on the Security Council preferred to turn a blind eye to all that and encouraged the rest of the Council to do the same, implying that the three countries should work without pressure and present concrete results afterwards. At the same time, they would repeat like a mantra that they had full confidence in the authorities of those countries and were convinced of the effectiveness of their investigations.
On these pretexts, the Western members of the Security Council did not support two Russian initiatives last year - a draft Security Council resolution instructing the UN Secretary-General to submit considerations on the formation of an international independent commission under UN auspices to investigate into the incidents; and a draft statement by the President of the Security Council expressing concern over the lack of any information from the international community on the progress of the investigations.
At the end of the day, the dangerous scenario about which the Russian Federation and a number of other colleagues had repeatedly warned the Security Council began to unfold right before our eyes. Last February, information was circulated in the United Nations Security Council that the Danish and Swedish authorities had discontinued their national investigations. And what did they find out? Nothing. The only concrete conclusion available was the conclusion made in the first days after the terrorist attack. According to it, the Nord Stream pipes had been deliberately destroyed by explosive devices. And even though this fact was explicitly stated, the conclusion pointed out that there were no grounds for continuing criminal proceedings under those countries’ jurisdictions. That is, there is a crime, but no one is going to identify those responsible and bring them to account. Imagine a murder investigation that comes to a conclusion, after a year of proceedings, that the victim indeed had been murdered. That looks more like an absurdist theatre, but that’s what we have. We know that Sweden, Denmark and Germany have lately circulated another letter that adds nothing to what we say today.
However, Western members of the Security Council do not seem embarrassed by this unflattering situation and such unconvincing conclusions by their allies. Besides, they have actually staged another act of this absurdist performance by sabotaging in an outright manner the negotiations on another PRST, which we proposed this month. We conceived it as a document that would have allowed us to assess the situation surrounding the undermining of the Nord Stream pipes after the termination of the Danish and Swedish investigations. As expected of good-faith sponsors, we have made this draft PRST truly well-balanced.
Throughout the negotiation process, a number of Security Council members would argue that it was "premature" to qualify the undermining of the Nord Stream as a terrorist attack. To our surprise, Western countries proved extremely inconvenienced by any reference to the terrorist nature of the attack. That includes reference based on the provisions of an international instrument to which they are parties - the 1997 International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings. This begs a logical question. How do our Western colleagues even qualify what happened, if not as a terrorist attack? Previously, it seemed to us that their statements to the Council implied this exact qualification.
But there is more to it. When working on the draft PRST, we got surprised by quite a number of things. Western colleagues, contrary to firm facts and basic logic, tried to incorporate into the draft statement praises to Copenhagen and Stockholm for their supposedly "effective and impartial investigations". I remind you that those were the same investigations that a year earlier had figured out that the gas pipeline had been blown up.
Guided by some incomprehensible logic, they tried to remove from the text any language about a hypothetical possibility of collective efforts to take place after the current investigations are over with a view to clarifying the circumstances of the incidents. In general, when engaging on the draft, our Western colleagues kept betraying and exposing themselves, demonstrating their total lack of interest in identifying and holding accountable the perpetrators of the Nord Stream attack. There is simply no other explanation for their behavior. With this understanding, we considered further work on the draft statement by the President of the Security Council to be pointless. I want to say this in this meeting, and I hope that this unseemly situation has clearly shown to our colleagues from the Global South the true intentions of Western delegations with regard to the terrorist attacks on the Nord Stream pipes. All they need to do is keep this issue from the UNSC attention while covering up for their allies who do not provide the international community with any useful information and refuse to cooperate with Russia, as stipulated, in particular, in Article 10 of the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings, to which I referred earlier today. I should also like to point out in this connection that all requests from the Russian competent authorities for cooperation in the investigation of the terrorist attack on Nord Stream to their counterparts from European countries who conduct the investigations have been consistently and ostentatiously ignored. Whatever feedback we received, it was nothing more than formal replies. We circulated copies of these communications among UNSC members in 2023 for the reference of our colleagues.
Taking into account this unacceptable situation, on March 21 and 22, 2024, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation sent notes to the embassies of Denmark, Germany, Sweden and Switzerland in Moscow in connection with the failure of these states to fulfill their obligations under the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings and the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism. These notes stated that there is a dispute between Russia and these states under the aforementioned Conventions and contained a request for negotiations on their interpretation and application. We also submitted copies of these notes for circulation as official documents of the UN Security Council and General Assembly.
Mr.President,
I urge all colleagues today to ask themselves a question. How can we explain a situation when a state or a group of states pay lip service to condemning a crime, while at the same time resisting in every possible way the common efforts to identify the perpetrators? Any reasonable person would suspect a foul, double-dealing play. This suspicion will but grow if we recall that politicians from that state (or states) called for this crime to be committed, and rejoiced when it finally was. You and I have all heard and seen these statements by senior American officials and their allies. And then the United States and its allies engaged in a coordinated campaign to disseminate absurd and sometimes contradictory versions of the events in the Western media.
I anticipate that after our statement, the American colleagues will cry out with indignation how dare we blame the United States and its allies. If so, then would you perhaps bother to explain everything that is happening, as well as the confessions of your leaders and the demonstrative sabotage of efforts aimed at launching an international investigation? And when doing so, will you please make sure to sound like representatives of a permanent member of the UN Security Council rather than the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland?
It is symptomatic that private sector has recently joined the ridiculous narrative of the Western political and media establishment. As reported by the media, the insurance companies ‘Lloyd's of London’ and ‘Arch Insurance’ refuse to pay compensation to the gas pipeline operator Nord Stream AG because Nord Stream was allegedly damaged as a result of military operations. It would be very interesting to know: what kind of armed conflict is taking place in the area of Bornholm Island in the exclusive economic zone of Denmark and Sweden, and if these states are actually aware of it? Moreover, the insurers themselves conclude that the undermining of the gas pipelines was carried out with an explosive device, maliciously and for political reasons, thus confirming its terrorist nature.
Mr.President,
We have no doubt that during today's meeting our Western colleagues will continue with the same ridiculous and self-exposing praise of the Danish and Swedish authorities, who have wasted a year and a half, as well as defending the German investigation, the results of which the international community still knows nothing about. They will continue to talk about the lack of "added value" in international efforts. Their goals are clear enough - to be telling this "tale about the lost time" infinitely in the hope that the international community will forget about the Nord Stream attack. The thing is, it will not forget, and that’s for sure. If Western narrative already looked unconvincing, now their arguments simply cannot be taken seriously. No doubt that more and more UN Member States are seeing that now.
By the way, we all see that when needs be, the United States and its allies do not delay investigations. Suffice it to recall the damage to the Balticconnector gas pipeline and communication cable connecting Finland and Estonia that occurred on October 8, 2023. Preliminary conclusions of the investigation were made public after only ten days. Better still, I can give you an even more recent example. Even before the publication of preliminary results of the investigation into the terrorist attack on concert venue ‘Crocus City Hall’ near Moscow that took place a month ago, the United States and its allies, contrary to objective facts, concluded within 24 hours that the Kiev regime had nothing to do with it, and tried (they still do, for that matter) to convince us that ISIL was involved. What a miracle! They were able to do it here, but somehow they failed to do it (and are preventing others) as regards the Nord Stream blasts. I wonder if Washington realizes how absurd this looks? Or are they taking the rest of the world for fools?
Anyways, we should like to emphasize once again that Russia and other constructively-minded states will not allow this issue to be put on the back burner. Since Denmark and Sweden have already formally testified to their own impotence, and Germany is not sharing any updates on the progress of the investigation, if any, it should be obvious to everyone that the true circumstances of what happened can only be established through international cooperation and despite the efforts of a US-led group of countries who are willing to cover up the tracks. Otherwise, we will find ourselves in a world without rules and legality, where any state might fall victim to a terrorist attack against critical transnational pipeline infrastructure, carried out by the well-known pioneers of "rule-based order".
No matter how hard the perpetrators try, they will not get away with it. Our country will continue to use all the tools at our disposal to that end. We call on all reasonable states who are not associated with the attack to support these efforts and jointly send a firm and unambiguous message that terrorist attacks on cross-border submarine pipeline infrastructure are unacceptable. It is time to oppose the "rule-based order" with international law.
Thank you.
Right of reply:
Mr.President,
The narrative of our Western partners and the statements we heard today did not surprise us. Frankly speaking, we had not expected anything other than that. But I would like to draw attention to the fact that many of them linked the conflict and the developments in Ukraine to the undermining of the Nord Stream. I would like these countries to answer the question: do you really link the two events? The answer to this question will be very revealing in terms of understanding what happened with the Nord Stream.
Thank you.
Second reply:
Mr.President,
We listened to the response of our British colleague. He spoke about consistency.
I would like to remind you that Nord Stream is an international gas transit infrastructure to which the provisions of the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings apply. This is what we are discussing here today, not what the Western delegations referred to in their statements.
Thank you.
