05:47The EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said he was 'not afraid of any truth', following a report that a 'pro-Ukrainian’ group could be behind the Nord Stream pipeline blasts, during a briefing with Swedish Defence Minister Pal Jonson in Stockholm on Wednesday.
"First, never be afraid of the truth. I am not afraid of the truth. Any truth. But we are talking about, for the time being, speculations. Investigations on the exact circumstances are still ongoing," he stated.
"As long as investigations are ongoing, we cannot draw definitive conclusions," he added, before claiming that the main lesson was to be "more vigilant about the resilience of our critical infrastructure."
Jonson also refused to be drawn on the claims, saying due to "an ongoing inquiry by the prosecutor and being conducted in support by the Swedish security service", he would wait until the investigation was complete. Similar inquiries are believed to be continuing in both Germany and Denmark.
Borrell was in Sweden to chair a meeting of EU defence ministers, discussing future military procurement for Ukraine in the conflict with Russia.
He highlighted that the bloc would have trained 11,000 Ukrainian soldiers by the end of the month, and 30,000 by the end of the year.
The representative also outlined a 'three track' process, including a billion euros for the restocking of ammunition given to Kiev, a fast-track for supplies to reduce costs and delivery times, and increased support for EU states' armies.
"We are in war times and we’ve had to have, I’m sorry to say, war mentality," he said. "I would prefer to talk about peace, I would prefer very much to talk about peace negotiations, but unhappily I have to talk about ammunitions because the war continues raging."
Moscow has accused Kiev’s Western allies of escalating the conflict with Ukraine with repeated arms deliveries, saying they will only prolong the fighting and won’t change the outcome.
On Tuesday, the New York Times published a report claiming that US officials had intelligence suggesting a 'pro-Ukrainian group' was behind September’s Nord Stream pipeline blasts.
Kiev strongly denied any involvement in the explosions at the underwater sites.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov claimed that 'clearly the authors of the attack want to divert attention' and called it an 'obvious misinformation campaign co-ordinated by the media'.
In February, an article by US journalist Seymour Hersh alleged that explosives were planted at the pipelines by US Navy divers on US President Joe Biden’s orders. The White House called it 'utterly false and total fiction'.
At the time, the EU, US, NATO and Moscow all claimed 'sabotage' to be the reason for the incident. President Vladimir Putin said that the West had 'effectively attempted to destroy the pan-European energy infrastructure'.
Western countries avoided directly accusing Moscow although Biden accused Russia of 'pumping out disinformation and lies'.
Sweden: 'I am not afraid of any truth' - EU's Borrell amid allegations 'pro-Ukrainian' group behind Nord Stream blasts
The EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said he was 'not afraid of any truth', following a report that a 'pro-Ukrainian’ group could be behind the Nord Stream pipeline blasts, during a briefing with Swedish Defence Minister Pal Jonson in Stockholm on Wednesday.
"First, never be afraid of the truth. I am not afraid of the truth. Any truth. But we are talking about, for the time being, speculations. Investigations on the exact circumstances are still ongoing," he stated.
"As long as investigations are ongoing, we cannot draw definitive conclusions," he added, before claiming that the main lesson was to be "more vigilant about the resilience of our critical infrastructure."
Jonson also refused to be drawn on the claims, saying due to "an ongoing inquiry by the prosecutor and being conducted in support by the Swedish security service", he would wait until the investigation was complete. Similar inquiries are believed to be continuing in both Germany and Denmark.
Borrell was in Sweden to chair a meeting of EU defence ministers, discussing future military procurement for Ukraine in the conflict with Russia.
He highlighted that the bloc would have trained 11,000 Ukrainian soldiers by the end of the month, and 30,000 by the end of the year.
The representative also outlined a 'three track' process, including a billion euros for the restocking of ammunition given to Kiev, a fast-track for supplies to reduce costs and delivery times, and increased support for EU states' armies.
"We are in war times and we’ve had to have, I’m sorry to say, war mentality," he said. "I would prefer to talk about peace, I would prefer very much to talk about peace negotiations, but unhappily I have to talk about ammunitions because the war continues raging."
Moscow has accused Kiev’s Western allies of escalating the conflict with Ukraine with repeated arms deliveries, saying they will only prolong the fighting and won’t change the outcome.
On Tuesday, the New York Times published a report claiming that US officials had intelligence suggesting a 'pro-Ukrainian group' was behind September’s Nord Stream pipeline blasts.
Kiev strongly denied any involvement in the explosions at the underwater sites.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov claimed that 'clearly the authors of the attack want to divert attention' and called it an 'obvious misinformation campaign co-ordinated by the media'.
In February, an article by US journalist Seymour Hersh alleged that explosives were planted at the pipelines by US Navy divers on US President Joe Biden’s orders. The White House called it 'utterly false and total fiction'.
At the time, the EU, US, NATO and Moscow all claimed 'sabotage' to be the reason for the incident. President Vladimir Putin said that the West had 'effectively attempted to destroy the pan-European energy infrastructure'.
Western countries avoided directly accusing Moscow although Biden accused Russia of 'pumping out disinformation and lies'.
The EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said he was 'not afraid of any truth', following a report that a 'pro-Ukrainian’ group could be behind the Nord Stream pipeline blasts, during a briefing with Swedish Defence Minister Pal Jonson in Stockholm on Wednesday.
"First, never be afraid of the truth. I am not afraid of the truth. Any truth. But we are talking about, for the time being, speculations. Investigations on the exact circumstances are still ongoing," he stated.
"As long as investigations are ongoing, we cannot draw definitive conclusions," he added, before claiming that the main lesson was to be "more vigilant about the resilience of our critical infrastructure."
Jonson also refused to be drawn on the claims, saying due to "an ongoing inquiry by the prosecutor and being conducted in support by the Swedish security service", he would wait until the investigation was complete. Similar inquiries are believed to be continuing in both Germany and Denmark.
Borrell was in Sweden to chair a meeting of EU defence ministers, discussing future military procurement for Ukraine in the conflict with Russia.
He highlighted that the bloc would have trained 11,000 Ukrainian soldiers by the end of the month, and 30,000 by the end of the year.
The representative also outlined a 'three track' process, including a billion euros for the restocking of ammunition given to Kiev, a fast-track for supplies to reduce costs and delivery times, and increased support for EU states' armies.
"We are in war times and we’ve had to have, I’m sorry to say, war mentality," he said. "I would prefer to talk about peace, I would prefer very much to talk about peace negotiations, but unhappily I have to talk about ammunitions because the war continues raging."
Moscow has accused Kiev’s Western allies of escalating the conflict with Ukraine with repeated arms deliveries, saying they will only prolong the fighting and won’t change the outcome.
On Tuesday, the New York Times published a report claiming that US officials had intelligence suggesting a 'pro-Ukrainian group' was behind September’s Nord Stream pipeline blasts.
Kiev strongly denied any involvement in the explosions at the underwater sites.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov claimed that 'clearly the authors of the attack want to divert attention' and called it an 'obvious misinformation campaign co-ordinated by the media'.
In February, an article by US journalist Seymour Hersh alleged that explosives were planted at the pipelines by US Navy divers on US President Joe Biden’s orders. The White House called it 'utterly false and total fiction'.
At the time, the EU, US, NATO and Moscow all claimed 'sabotage' to be the reason for the incident. President Vladimir Putin said that the West had 'effectively attempted to destroy the pan-European energy infrastructure'.
Western countries avoided directly accusing Moscow although Biden accused Russia of 'pumping out disinformation and lies'.