This story was originally published by the WND News Center.

It was only months ago that Russia's Nord Stream pipelines, to deliver gas to Europe and other points, were bombed underwater, putting them out of commission.

Now Russia is demanding that the U.S. prove it didn't do it.

The Washington Examiner reported Russia "called on the United States" to prove its non-involvement.

"We qualify the incident as an act of international terrorism that requires a comprehensive and independent investigation," Igor Girenko, of the Russian Embassy to the U.S., said in the report.

"It wouldn't hurt if the U.S., which claims the monopoly on the truth, shifted from empty accusations directed at us to the matter at hand and at least try to prove it wasn't involved in the destruction of the gas pipelines," he charged.

Triggering the demand was a report posted on Substack by famed investigative reporter Seymour Hersh that Joe Biden actually ordered the bombing – despite Biden's repeated claims that he didn't.

Hersh, a Pulitzer-winner who uncovered the My Lai massacre in Vietnam, said an inside source informed him U.S. Navy divers, last June while operating under the cover of a "widely publicized" NATO exercise called BALTOPS22, "planted the remotely triggered explosives that, three months later, destroyed three of the four Nord Stream pipes."

The report explains the confirmation comes from "a source with direct knowledge of the operational planning."

Two of the lines, known as Nord Stream 1, were supplying Germany and other points in Western Europe with "cheap Russian natural gas," the report said.

A second pair, Nord Stream 2, were not operating yet.

The White House claimed the report was wrong.

But Hersh reported Biden and his foreign policy team had been "hostile" to the pipelines for a long time, largely because of the revenue being provided to Russia.

He explained Washington viewed the gas supply route to be a way of providing huge profits to Russia – and Putin's agenda.

He said, "Nord Stream 1 was dangerous enough, in the view of NATO and Washington, but Nord Stream 2, whose construction was completed in September of 2021, would, if approved by German regulators, double the amount of cheap gas that would be available to Germany and Western Europe. The second pipeline also would provide enough gas for more than 50 percent of German's annual consumption. Tensions were constantly escalating between Russia and NATO, backed by the aggressive foreign policy of the Biden administration."

Biden, in fact, had publicly threatened earlier to make sure the pipeline was halted.