First the words of the new chancellor Olaf Scholz, then the even clearer ones of the Foreign Minister, the Green Annalena Baerbock, and finally the release of the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The price of gas has returned to rise by 11.05% to 117.46 euros per megawatt hour, the highest value after the peak of last 6 October at 125.76 euros in the wake of the growing international tensions between Brussels and Moscow and the concerns about the entry into operation, currently suspended, of Nord Stream 2, the new gas pipeline that connects Russia to Germany via the Baltic Sea, thus bypassing the Ukraine with which Moscow is increasingly in conflict. The entry into operation of the Russian-German infrastructure cannot be approved “at present” by Germany because “it does not meet the requirements of EU energy law and security issues remain,” said the new foreign minister. German during an interview with the television broadcaster “Zdf”.
The Nord Stream 2 pipeline operator meets all the requirements of the German regulator for certification but you have to be patient, as legal work is underway with the regulator, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. As you know, about a month ago the Federal Network Agency of the Federal Republic of Germany temporarily suspended the approval procedure for a purely bureaucratic matter. An unexpected event that has postponed the entry into operation of the infrastructure opposed by the United States at the end of next quarter, if all goes well. Thus further aggravating the tensions on prices, which are already on the rise due to a long series of factors also linked to the fearful forecasts of a harsher winter than usual.
However, the words of the German minister seem to add other pitfalls along the path of approval of Nord Stream 2. A fact now appears certain according to most observers: the pipeline will not come into operation before the end of this winter, during which the Europe, already short of gas, will have to make use of the supplies that will come from Russia in the first place (which supplies 40% of European gas) and from its other suppliers. As of December 4, 23.4% of the gas injected in the current thermal season in European underground storage plants (UGs) had already been withdrawn, the Russian energy company Gazprom said. Ugs plants in Europe were already 66.78 per cent full at the beginning of the month, with gas volumes of just over 72 billion cubic meters, about 17 billion cubic meters less than the average of the last five years.
For weeks, the state giant Gazprom has reduced supplies to the Old Continent to fill its reserves put to the test by the previous particularly cold winter and to cope with the anomalous cold that is affecting the north-west of Russia in particular. . And, according to several analysts and EU commissioners such as Josep Borrell, also to put implicit pressure for a rapid approval of the new gas pipeline.
Behind the growing tensions and price rises there are not only commercial reasons, but also military ones. Concern is growing these days about a possible invasion of Ukraine by the Russian army. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said it is unlikely that the Nord Stream 2 pipeline will become operational “if Russia attacks Ukraine”. “I think President Putin has to take this into account too,” said Blinken, interviewed on Nbc. The secretary of state added that “we are ready to take the kind of steps we have refrained from taking in the past” if Russia does not withdraw.
Beyond the military implications, for Europe it risks not doing well on the supply front. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a close ally of Vladimir Putin, reiterated his intention to block the transit of Russian gas to Europe in the event of more severe sanctions against Minsk. These words also helped to push the price of gas up: “If the sanctions they are imposing on us or will impose on us in the future will put us in a state of emergency and we will not be able to respond in any other way, we will resort to this severe measure. ”Said Lukashenko. It is not the first time that the Belarusian leader has made such releases. For several weeks, over two thousand migrants from Middle Eastern countries have been massed on the border between Belarus and the countries of the European Union, in an attempt to obtain political asylum from the EU. Brussels then accused Minsk of creating the migration crisis in order to destabilize the eastern border of the European Union.
Archived the sixteen years of Angela Merkel, during which she was often accused of excessive compliance with Russia (and for other reasons, China), the words of the new federal government on the gas pipeline of discord still seem to mark a first difference compared to the period of the Chancellor. His successor Scholz also recently said that the German government “will do everything possible” to ensure the flow of gas from Russia through Ukraine, a way of expressing its support for Kiev, which fears it will be cut off from Russian supplies. Europe (on which it collects transit rights) and to be left alone in the face of military aggression from Moscow. Just today came the accusation by the Defense Minister of Kiev Oleksy Reznikov, reported by the Financial Times, according to which Berlin had “blocked” the supply of NATO weapons destined for Ukraine, despite the alarm raised by the Alliance on the danger of an aggression by Russia. “They are still building the Nord Stream 2 pipeline and at the same time blocking our defense weapons, which is very unfair,” the minister said. Reznikov says that Berlin would have vetoed NATO on the supply of “lethal” weapons, in particular on anti-sniper systems and special anti-drone rifles, adding however that German intransigence on the latter has eased somewhat as they are “non-lethal” weapons.
According to Kiev, the veto came from former Chancellor Angela Merkel and forced the Ukrainian government to try to procure weapons through bilateral agreements with individual NATO member states. As for the new government of Olaf Scholz, his position on the matter is not yet clear, notes the FT, even if the new vice-chancellor and ‘green’ minister of the economy, Robert Habeck, recalls the newspaper, recently stated that the request for arms from Kiev would be “difficult to deny”. Reznikov says that “the strategy of not provoking Moscow does not work and will never work”, and recalls how Russia invaded Georgia in 2008 after Berlin and Paris blocked Tbilisi’s access to NATO.
Although it is still early to draw conclusions, the positions of the new German government seem oriented towards a clearer condemnation of Moscow’s provocations. And therefore more aligned on Brussels: “We discussed the increase of the Russian military presence on the Ukrainian border. The EU stands united and firm in support of Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity ”, said the High Representative for EU Foreign Policy, Josep Borrell.
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