Press Secretary of the President of Russia and Deputy Chairman of the Presidential Administration Dmitry Peskov said that the issue of resuming gas supplies through the Nord Stream pipeline is connected with the lifting of anti-Russian sanctions. It is they, according to the official, that do not allow the Russian side to properly service the gas turbines necessary for gas supplies to Europe. Peskov's words are quoted by Interfax.

“Problems in pumping arose due to the sanctions that were imposed against our country and against a number of companies by Western states, including Germany and Great Britain. There are no other reasons that would lead to problems with pumping, ”the official says.

Peskov assures that Gazprom has only one unit left, which "faults, breaks, which leads to a stop in pumping." The press secretary of the Russian President insists that Western restrictions "bring absolute confusion, legal, practical, in what is connected with the maintenance of all components and assemblies" of the Nord Stream gas pipeline. He also expressed hope that the only gas turbine, which has been used to pump gas until now, will be put in order and returned to work.

“Sanctions that prevent the maintenance of units, which prevent them from moving without appropriate legal guarantees, which prevent these legal guarantees from being given, and so on, it is these sanctions that the Western states have introduced that have brought the situation to what we see now,” the official said. .

The European side is confident that Gazprom and the Russian authorities are deliberately using far-fetched pretexts about the technical problems of the gas pipeline in order not to supply gas to Europe and use gas exports as an instrument of pressure on the EU due to support for Ukraine. Moreover, the German company Siemens, which owns gas turbines for the gas pipeline, has repeatedly stated that the Russian side deliberately refuses to accept the turbine under various legal pretexts.

Gazprom stopped the operation of the Nord Stream gas pipeline on August 31. Initially, it was assumed that the pipeline will resume operation on September 3, but the Russian side later announced that it was forced to stop pumping for an indefinite period.