Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday said Russia has intelligence suggesting plans to sabotage the TurkStream and Blue Stream pipelines under the Black Sea in a bid to upend Ukraine peace talks.
Speaking at an annual meeting of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) in Moscow, Putin said the threat would likely surface in media coverage that same day.
“Right now, our operational information is coming in. It will likely appear in the media today, maybe it already has. It concerns a possible explosion targeting Russia’s undersea gas pipelines along the bottom of the Black Sea. This is the so-called TurkStream and Blue Stream. They just can’t quit,” he said, according to Russian state news agency RIA Novosti.
Putin said those behind the alleged plot were trying to wreck the diplomatic track on Ukraine. “They are doing everything to carry out some kind of provocation and break everything that, let’s say it carefully, has been achieved on this negotiation track,” he said.
He did not name anyone responsible. Moscow has repeatedly blamed Ukraine and its Western backers for attacks on Russian energy infrastructure.
Putin also said adversaries had failed to defeat Russia. “They can’t live without it or believe they can’t. They are looking for any way — any, anything at all. They will push themselves to some extreme point, and then they’ll regret it,” he added.
An unnamed source told RIA Novosti that Ankara had been briefed on the statements and that further coordination would happen privately. Russia’s embassy in Ankara posted Putin’s remarks on X in Turkish, flagging the reported pipeline threat.
Ukraine did not comment. Kyiv has previously denied Russian accusations of attacking energy infrastructure while accusing Moscow of striking Ukrainian civilian targets.
The pipelines
TurkStream runs 930 kilometers under the Black Sea from Russia to Turkey, and onward into Southeast Europe via Bulgaria. Operational since January 2020, it has an annual capacity of 31.5 billion cubic meters, one line for Turkey, a second for southeastern and central Europe.
Blue Stream, which opened in 2003, connects Russia to Turkey’s Black Sea coast near Samsun. Built jointly by Gazprom and Italy’s Eni, it carries up to 16 billion cubic meters a year.
Both pipelines took on new importance after Ukraine stopped transit on January 1, 2025, when its transit agreement with Russia lapsed. TurkStream is now the only pipeline route for Russian gas into EU markets.
Previous threats
Warnings about potential Black Sea pipeline sabotage have grown more frequent over the past year. In January 2025 Russia accused Ukraine of striking a compressor station in southern Russia that feeds TurkStream. Moscow said the drones were intercepted, with falling debris causing minor damage.
The next day, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov accused the United States of planning to sabotage TurkStream, claiming Washington was directing attacks through its “Ukrainian proxies.”
In March 2025, Russia accused Ukraine of hitting the Russkaya compressor station in the Krasnodar region and said the timing coincided with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s visit to Washington. Lavrov asked Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan to use Ankara’s influence with Kyiv to stop further attacks. Fidan said Turkey would take the “necessary measures.”