©AP Photo/Seth Wenig
China supports Russia's draft resolution submitted to the UN Security Council to investigate the terrorist attack on Russia’s Nord Stream gas system, Zhang Jun, China's Permanent Representative to the UN, told reporters on Monday.
The document may be put to the vote this week, Russia has requested a UN Security Council meeting on the situation with the pipelines for February 22.
"Of course" the diplomat said.
"We heard the call from members of the Security Council to have investigation over the explosion. We see that request is legitimate," the Chinese diplomat added. " We are supportive to have the SC discussions and also to take appropriate actions to make sure that we have a clear picture on what happened and then to get those who have done that, accountable," Zhang Jun said.
On February 17, Russia submitted a draft UN Security Council resolution to investigate the terrorist attack on the gas system. It proposes that the UN secretary general create an independent international commission of lawyers to investigate the sabotage.
According to a TASS source, the document stresses that the lawyers should be impartial and have international recognition and experience. The commission also should include the necessary number of experts. If the resolution is adopted, the UN secretary general is to make a report to the UN Security Council about concrete modalities of creating the commission within 14 days.
The text of the proposed document also condemns the fact that a number of interested parties, including the pipeline operator, were not allowed to participate in the probe into the blasts.
On September 27, 2022, Nord Stream AG reported unprecedented damage that occurred the day before on three strings of the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 offshore gas pipelines. On September 26, Swedish seismologists registered two explosions on the pipeline routes. The Russian Prosecutor General's Office launched a criminal case based on charges of international terrorism.
A spokesman for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs also noted how the US became "unusually silent" after Seymour Hersh named Washington as the real culprit behind the explosions that took out Nord Stream.
Beijing supports the Russian draft resolution to the UN Security Council on the establishment of a commission to investigate the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, China’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Zhang Jun told reporters.
Earlier in the day, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said that the international community has the right to demand a thorough investigation of Nord Stream’s destruction.
The Chinese diplomat pointed out that the explosions that ruptured three of the four pipelines that comprise the Nord Stream and Nord Stream 2 projects has had a seriously negative effect on global energy markets and on the environment as well.
Therefore, Wang Wenbin argued, an “objective, impartial and professional” investigation into this matter should be conducted.
During a regular press conference last week, Wang also drew attention to the United States' reaction to the Nord Stream sabotage and how it changed after Seymour Hersh's revelations earlier this month.
"Why was it (the US) vocal about investigations and accountability immediately after the Nord Stream blast, and yet unusually silent in the wake of the latest investigative report written by a US journalist?" he inquired.
Last week, the Russian Mission to the UN requested a UN Security Council meeting on the Nord Stream attacks for February 22.
In February, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh released an expose on the Nord Stream’s destruction, claiming that the pipelines were blown up by the United States with assistance from Norway.
According to Hersh’s revelations, US navy divers planted explosives on the pipelines during summer 2022 under the cover of a NATO military exercise in the Baltic Sea, with the charges being triggered remotely three months later in order to avoid suspicion.
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