Collections about Nord Stream 2 - end of September
Russian Foreign Ministry slams US attempts to forge coalition against Nord Stream 2
Russian intelligence chief points to West’s anti-Nord Stream 2 scheme fueling Navalny case
3. Marine Insurers Shun Russia’s Nord Stream 2 and TurkStream Projects
September 23, 2020?by?Reuters
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Infographic: Political debate over Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline enters overdrive
Source:?https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-news/natural-gas/092320-infographic-nord-stream-2-pipeline-russia-germany-halt-navalny
MOSCOW, September 23. /TASS/. Russia rejects US attempts to oppose the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project by forging a coalition of project opponents, spokeswoman of the Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday.
"We condemn calls for forging a certain coalition against the pipeline, wherein German and other companies have already made multi-billion investments," the diplomat said.
The Nord Stream 2 project envisages?the construction of two pipeline strings with a total capacity of 55 bln cubic meters per year from the coast of Russia through the Baltic Sea to Germany. To date, 93.5% of Nord Stream 2 has been finished. The construction was suspended at the end of 2019 when the Swiss pipe-laying company Allseas stopped work due to US sanctions.
Source:?https://tass.com/politics/1203513
Russian intelligence chief points to West’s anti-Nord Stream 2 scheme fueling Navalny case
According to the high-ranking official, the efforts to block the Nord Stream 2 project are a typical example of unfair competition for the European market of gas.
MOSCOW, September 22. /TASS/. Russia’s foreign intelligence service SVR has exposed some Western countries’ involvement in fueling the Alexey Navalny case, with the Nord Stream 2 project being the main target, SVR Director Sergei?Naryshkin said in a statement issued by the SVR press bureau on Tuesday.
"The SVR has observed intensive activity by some Western countries in fueling the so-called Navalny case. It is increasingly evident that the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project is one of the main targets," he noted.
Naryshkin said the efforts to block this project, disguised as a "means of punishing Russia for Navalny" were a typical example of unfair competition for the European gas market. "It is extremely important for Washington to have this project aborted, because it calls into question the White House’s plans for stepping up supplies of US liquefied gas to Europe," Naryshkin specified. The intelligence chief said the following points were very telling: US president Donald Trump’s calls addressed to Germany to quit Nord Stream 2, US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo’s statements about including the gas pipeline project in the new version of the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act and threats from several Republican senators to the authorities of Germany’s port Mukran.
"Alongside such outspoken demarches, the Americans have unleashed a campaign of pressure against European countries through various confidential channels to demand the blocking of Nord Stream 2. In a situation like this it is not surprising that the project has come under the most odious attacks from Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Ukraine, which fall over themselves to demonstrate their usefulness to Washington," Naryshkin said.
He stressed that the logic of the Western countries’ speculations to the effect that Russia’s income?from energy cooperation with Europe was being used to create threats to European stability did not hold water. "It might have been said just as easily that US export revenues are used for crackdowns on protesters in Portland, or the money France earns by selling its wines and oysters help beat up the ‘yellow vests’. We don’t go as far as such absurdities," Naryshkin said. He believes that most Europeans are aware that the refusal to participate in the project would cause them much harm. The resource base for rebooting the European economy would be considerably narrowed in a situation where the economic slump in Europe, according to Deutsche Bank estimates, will reach 8.6%. Also, the problem of employment amid the coronavirus crisis would get worse.
The top intel official hoped the EU’s common sense would prevail ahead of the winter season. "I do hope that the EU will not shoot itself in the foot. Even more so since weather forecasts promise a cold winter and gas will be in great demand," he warned.
Navalny case
Navalny was rushed to a local hospital in the Siberian city of Omsk on August 20 after collapsing on a Moscow-bound flight from Tomsk. He fell into a coma and was put on a ventilator in an intensive care unit. On August 22, he was airlifted to Berlin and admitted to the Charite hospital.
On September 2, Berlin claimed that having examined Navalny’s test samples, German government toxicologists had come to the conclusion that the blogger had been affected by a toxic agent belonging to the Novichok family.
Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia was ready for comprehensive cooperation with Germany. He pointed out that no poisonous substances had been detected in Navalny’s system prior to his transfer to Berlin. Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that the German Foreign Office had not provided the Russian ambassador with any proof of its version of the incident.
On September 7, doctors at the Berlin clinic said Navalny had been removed from the coma and disconnected from the lung ventilator.
Marine Insurers Shun Russia’s Nord Stream 2 and TurkStream Projects
September 23, 2020?by?Reuters
OSCOW, Sept 23 (Reuters) – The world’s largest group of shipping insurers will not insure vessels involved in the Russian-led Nord Stream 2 and TurkStream gas pipeline projects because of the threat of U.S. sanctions.
Associations belonging to the International Group of P&I Clubs, including the Shipowners’ Club and the London P&I Club, said in a circular on Monday that it would not provide cover “for any activity involving or related to the Nord Stream 2 or TurkStream construction projects.”
It said members were “strongly urged to assess and mitigate the risks of entering into contracts on the Nord Stream 2 or TurkStream construction projects and exercise the fullest possible due diligence to avoid exposure to sanctions or enforcement actions.”
The International Group of P&I Clubs represents the world’s top 13 ship insurers and covers nearly 90% of the world’s ocean-going tonnage. The notice carried by its members said that all clubs had issued similarly worded circulars regarding Nord Stream 2 and TurkStream.
Led by Russia’s Gazprom, the $11 billion Nord Stream 2 pipeline project to double the capacity of the existing Nord Stream 1 link is more than 90% complete and scheduled to begin operating next year.
U.S. president Donald Trump’s administration has sought to curb the Kremlin’s economic leverage over Europe and Turkey and has warned investors in the two natural gas pipelines could face sanctions.
Former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder is chairman of Nord Stream’s shareholders committee. Gazprom holds a 51% stake alongside German energy companies E.ON and Wintershall Dea, Engie of France and Dutch firm Gasunie.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has faced calls in recent weeks to halt Nord Stream 2 in response to the suspected poisoning of Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in Siberia last month.
The Kremlin has said the commercial project is beneficial to both Russia and European countries and that it should not be linked to the Navalny case.
TurkStream, which stretches 930 km (580 miles) across the Black Sea to Turkey, began operating this year.
(Reporting by Anton Kolodyazhnyy; writing by Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber; editing by Jason Neely)
Infographic: Political debate over Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline enters overdrive
It has been five years since a consortium of energy companies agreed in the summer of 2015 to build a second pipeline route to carry gas from Russia to Germany under the Baltic Sea.
Construction on the Nord Stream 2 route is very nearly complete — 94% of it is ready, by some accounts — but disquiet is rising among politicians and activists in Europe and the United States, and some believe the gas may never actually flow.
Few are now objecting on environmental grounds, even though green activists warn burning more fossil fuels will only contribute to the climate emergency.
Its supporters say the pipeline is entirely a commercial venture to send an additional 55 billion cubic metres to European markets.
Yet the bulk of the opposition is political: more and more voices believe Europe should be depending less on Russian energy, not more.
“It is totally against the European Union's aim of being more self-sufficient and less dependent on Russian energy,” said Henna Virkkunen, a Finnish MEP who has long opposed the pipeline.
The chances that the project could be cancelled wholescale now stand at "fifty-fifty", added Anders ?slund, a Swedish economist and senior fellow at the Atlantic Council think-tank.
Regional opposition
“If you broadly look at it there are only four countries that are in favour Nord Stream 2, and that’s Germany, Austria, Holland and Belgium. France is not in favour, it’s sort of indifferent,” he told Euronews, claiming that even countries along whose Baltic sea bed the pipeline runs are essentially opposed to its construction.
“Sweden is basically against but can’t find a legal reason to be against. Denmark is of course against.”
Before making landfall Nord Stream 2 skirts the shorelines of Finland, Sweden and the Danish island of Bornholm, and required approval from all three countries.
Virkkunen, the Finnish MEP, said the debate in Finland had been largely over the environmental impact, with little political discussion.
There was more of a debate in Denmark, whose approval was the last to come through: the country's energy agency?allowed?Russian ships just two months ago to begin laying parts of the pipeline around Bornholm.
Pressure on Germany
But it is the German government where pressure is mounting to find a way to pull out of the venture, especially since last month’s poisoning of Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny and his arrival in a Berlin hospital for treatment.
Heiko Maas, the German foreign minister, was quoted by Bild earlier this month as saying he hopped Russia "do not force us to change our position on Nord Stream".
A cacophony of views has emerged from politicians in the region.
Last Tuesday, Austria's president, Alexander Van der Bellen, insisted he saw no connection between Nord Stream 2 and the Navalny poisoning.
Two days later, the European Parliament?used a resolution?criticising Russia over the Navalny case to reiterate its earlier call to halt Nord Stream 2 entirely.
On Thursday members of Lithuania's parliament?called on Germany?to abandon the project entirely.
The United States, which would prefer Germany opted instead for American natural gas, is another powerful factor. It introduced sanctions last year that forced a delay in Nord Stream 2's construction and Congress has threatened more action against the five consortium companies.
It triggered a frenzied round of lobbying according to the newspaper Die Zeit, which?revealed?last week that German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz lobbied his US counterpart Steven Mnuchin in August, offering to finance two German gas terminals for American use in exchange for the US dropping its objections to Nord Stream 2.
'Not connected' to Navalny
For Virkkunnen, cancelling the pipeline would be a difficult decision to take but necessary for energy dependency.
But as far as Russia is concerned, the Navalny incident has no bearing and the project should not be “politicised”.
“This is a commercial project that is absolutely in line with the interests of both Russia and European Union countries, and primarily Germany,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call last week.
?slund predicted mounting domestic opposition within Germany’s governing party would be a factor in Chancellor Angela Merkel saying “enough is enough, that Nord Stream 2 is not in the European interest.”
When approached by Euronews, the German Finance Ministry declined to comment on whether the government was preparing to cancel Nord Stream 2.
A spokesman said it was “in contact with the US government regarding the issue of sanctions” and the pipeline.
