Here’s how Gazprom will gas Germany on Nord Stream 2

12 January 20213 years ago babelfish

All the news on Nord Stream 2 in Germany: the birth of the public foundation in Mecklenburg (with Gazprom money, according to the media) to circumvent the US sanctions and complete the gas pipeline, the reactions of Berlin (federal level) and the controversies

Galeotta was the foundation. A new think-tank was born in Schwerin, capital of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the Land of Northern Germany which wedges towards Poland and is bathed by the Baltic Sea. It is called “ Stiftung Klima- und Umweltschutz ”, which translated into Italian sounds like “Foundation for the defense of the climate and the environment”. But it is not ecological the purpose for which it was born, in a hurry, with the favorable vote of the majority regional deputies (SPD and CDU), of the left opposition (Linke) and with the abstention of most of the parliamentarians of the far right of Afd. The real objective is to “contribute to the progress of the works on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline ” by starting commercial activities within the framework of the responsibilities of this new public and non-profit institution.

The statute allows it. It is the expected "trick" , the coup de hand, with which a single German Land intends to write pages of foreign and energy policy.

To make the story more heated, the circumstance revealed by German media ( Bild, Welt, Spiegel ) that of the initial financial endowment, as many as 20 million euros came from Gazprom, through the subsidiary Nord Stream AG, and only 200,000 euros were allocated by the public coffers of Mecklenburg. Russian money for a German structure that serves to circumvent American sanctions. It sounds paradoxical and refers to cold war plots, with the roles reversed. In addition, the embarrassment of the use of German taxpayers' money, albeit to a largely minority.

The president of the Land, the Social Democrat Manuela Schwesig, defended her creation, which had been talked about for a few months. He did not deny the specific interest in the pipeline battle, but relegated it to a random, almost insignificant side effect. In a video message, Schwesig instead spent minutes and words to emphasize the foundation's future support for projects in defense of the environment, adding that the idea of setting up a specific organization was born from the desire to meet the will shown by the citizens to engage in the ecological terrain. An excess of confidence that has infuriated ecologists.

For Mecklenburg, the pipeline is a vital issue. In Lubmin, near Greifswald, there are the terminals of the two controversial pipelines that connect Russia with Germany: Nord Stream 1, already operational since 2011, and Nord Stream 2, which are missing only a few kilometers of pipes in territorial waters. Danish to be completed. His activity is linked to jobs and tax revenues, as well as an increased geopolitical importance for an area otherwise peripheral compared to the great European games. The step forward was probably also facilitated by fears that American sanctions could sooner or later also affect public institutions in the region, such as the port authorities that provided support for operations related to the pipeline. Measures to that effect were threatened in the summer, sparking a concerned debate about their legality or not. Then the same US legislators had dropped the hypothesis.

The first American sanctions had stopped the works at the very last mile, forcing the ships of the Swiss company All Sea, specialized in underwater pipe laying operations, to withdraw from the project for fear of economic consequences. Under the Baltic, everything remained silent for a year, until last month Gazprom's subsidiary Nord Stream 2 AG (also based in Switzerland) announced the resumption of work. A first part has already been completed in recent days, close to the Lubmin terminal. Now it is a question of completing the missing segment in Danish waters. The Russian motor ship Fortuna is at work, in recent months it has been anchored in a port on the island of Rügen, also in Mecklenburg, and has now moved to the area of operations where it will be assisted by other Russian ships, including the Baltic Explorer and the Murman .

Now the regional foundation offers itself as a shield for all the activities of the partners involved in the construction of the pipeline. These will pass through the public foundation thereby escaping the US sanctions radar.

No specific reaction from Moscow on the foundation of the foundation. Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak returned to Nord Stream 2 in an interview with Rbk TV to reiterate the thesis that the US opposition is due only to competitive reasons for natural gas and to be confident that the European companies involved in the project will collaborate to carry it out, without worrying about Washington's retaliation. Surely, the intervention of Mecklenburg can provide the necessary legal hat.

And Berlin? As usual, German national politics keeps the tone low on the matter. After the decisive role played in defining the EU-China agreement on investments, the Russian-German gas pipeline is the second serious point of friction between Germany and the United States. The news is in the public domain that new president Joe Biden did not like the forward flight over China, and it would not be surprising that he was also irritated by this further preemptive move.

Berlin's Foreign Minister, Heiko Maas, tried to throw water on the fire. In a statement he said he was skeptical about the functions of the public foundation: "It is a decision taken by the Land of Mecklenburg, not by the federal government". The minister said he continues to hope for a "friendly agreement" between Germany and the United States on the issue, underlining how, in the new regime of US sanctions against infrastructure, a consultation mechanism is foreseen: "Before the sanctions are implemented, there will be government consultations ”. And this is where Germany hopes to come up with offers that can be beneficial to all. Certainly, from Berlin there is no sign of wanting to give up on the project, which would result in an economic disaster not only for the energy consortia that are participating in it. But analysts urge us not to have too many illusions about the changing of the guard at the White House. Germany intends to resume the thread of relations with Washington, imagining that Biden is in tune with the strategy of German multilateralism. In this sense, the recent proposal for a Marshall Plan for US-EU democracy, launched over the weekend by Maas himself in an interview with the German news agency Dpa, must be understood. But this is a generic offer that has already attracted the teasing of the German press itself, which finds it a bit embarrassing that Germany, with its history, can imagine itself as an anchor of democracy for the United States. .

On the other hand, for what it's worth, the reactions of the media have also been sarcastic in commenting on Schwesig's new foundation. Not only the conservative press of the Springer group (from the tabloid Bild to the flagship Die Welt), but also the liberal press, such as Spiegel and Tagesspiegel : a hypocritical and embarrassing trick, the chorus was almost unanimous, "a good deal for Gazprom, not for Germany ".

This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/energia/ecco-come-gazprom-fa-gasare-la-germania-sul-nord-stream-2/ on Tue, 12 Jan 2021 12:56:23 +0000.