COPENHAGEN (Reuters) -The suspected sabotage against the Nord Stream gas pipelines does not constitute an attack on Sweden, Foreign Minister Ann Linde told SVT public television on Wednesday.
“This is not an attack against Sweden because it is not in our territory” Linde said. “It is an international incident”.
She said U.S. Secretary Anthony Blinken had offered support to find out what had happened and that both the EU and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg had been informed.
Denmark and Sweden on Tuesday said major leaks on the two Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea were caused by deliberate acts of sabotage carried out in each of the two countries’ exclusive economic zones.
The blasts were outside of Swedish or Danish territorial waters, however, the countries have said.
The blasts hitting Nord Stream 1 and 2 did not represent a direct military threat or attack on Sweden or Denmark, the Swedish and Danish prime ministers said late on Tuesday.
(Reporting by Stine Jacobsen, editing by Terje Solsvik)
