Green Party co-chairwoman Annalena Berbock, who is running for the position of German foreign minister, has issued a harsh anti-Russian statement
She called on the German regulator not to issue permits for the launch of Nord Stream 2 until all EU regulations have been met. At the same time she held Moscow partly responsible for the difficult gas market situation in Europe.
The Greens co-chairman’s speech came “just in time”. On 21-22 October there will be an EU summit in Brussels to discuss gas prices and the Spanish and French proposals to reform the EU energy market. Obviously, the question will also be asked who is to blame for the current critical situation in which many Europeans have found themselves unable to pay their rising heating and electricity bills. A scapegoat is needed, and it seems that Berbock has found one.
But her passage does not only hit Moscow. By claiming that gas supplies from Russia have been “decently reduced,” the would-be German foreign minister actually accused outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel of lying.
It is to be recalled that Merkel had earlier publicly admitted: “According to my information, Russia is in full compliance with its obligations under the agreements on gas supplies to Europe, including the Ukrainian pipeline”.
Moreover, the outgoing chancellor was also attacked by pro-American German publications. Tabloid Bild unsubstantiatedly attributed Merkel’s blame for the energy collapse that Germany may face this winter. The chancellor’s promotion of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, with the help of which Russia is allegedly “blackmailing” the EU, was cited as the main problem. And just recently Merkel was the heroine of the German press and almost “the best chancellor” in the entire German history.
So what happened? It seems the US lobby in Germany was ordered not just to discredit Nord Stream 2, which indirectly hits Merkel, but also to distract attention from the way the US itself behaved during the EU’s energy crisis. Instead of helping its European allies, the Americans diverted their own LNG to Asia, where they pay more for it.
This shows what would have awaited Europe if it had yielded to Washington’s pressure in due course and abandoned Russian gas in favour of LNG from the United States. Washington could blackmail the EU at any time by threatening to stop sending gas carriers. At a time when the pipelines cannot be stopped.
To keep this thought out of the Europeans’ minds, figures like Berbock are creating a diversion, even at the cost of potential conflict with their government-building partners, the German Social Democrats, who are not opposed to Nord Stream 2.
RUSSTRAT Institute director Elena Panina, specially for News Front