Nord Stream 2 Comes Under Fire in Germany

The ongoing debate within the German government on how to respond to the poisoning of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny is placing the future of Berlin’s Nord Stream 2 pipeline with Russia in doubt. On Sept. 8, the hospital in Berlin where Navalny is being treated said the Russian opposition figure had been removed from a medically induced coma after being poisoned on a flight to Moscow last month. That same day, Chancellor Angela Merkel told German lawmakers that she believes the European Union needs to react to the incident, but is skeptical of linking that crime to the natural gas pipeline from Russia to Germany. Intensifying calls for sanctions within Germany’s coalition government, however — including from Merkel’s own Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party, as well as its governing partner the Social Democratic Party (SPD) — could potentially shift her position.

In response to Navalny’s poisoning, the leader of the Christian Social Union (CSU) party, Manfred Weber, has repeatedly called for the freezing of construction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline as well. But on Sept. 3, Manuela Schwesig, the SPD state premier of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Pomerania (the state home to the landing points for the Nord Stream 2 pipeline), rejected such a construction freeze.
On Sept. 3, Norbert Rottgen, the chair of the Bundestag’s Foreign Affairs Committee and a candidate to become the next CDU leader, tweeted that the European Union should jointly decide to stop Nord Stream 2.
On Sept. 6, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, another member of the SPD, said that if Russia does not cooperate with the Navalny investigation in the coming days, Berlin would consider stopping Nord Stream 2

Poland is also adding to the pressure on the Nord Stream 2 project by offering Germany alternate energy routes, seeing Berlin’s struggle to define its policy toward Moscow as an opportunity to weaken Russian influence in Central Europe. A spokesman of the Polish government said on Sept. 9 that the Baltic Pipe, a project connecting Poland to North Sea gas production planned to come online by October 2022, could provide an alternative to Nord Stream 2 to help Germany meet its energy needs. With a capacity of just 10 billion cubic meters (bcm), the Baltic Pipe cannot fully replace the Nord Stream 2’s capacity of 50 bcm, which would still leave many German and Central European customers importing Russian gas through Ukraine’s pipelines. But for Poland, this would nonetheless be a victory by both disrupting Russia’s expansion of gas infrastructure, as well as forcing additional reliance on existing Ukrainian infrastructure.

Poland views Nord Stream 2 as an instrument of Russia’s power plays and influence in Western and Central Europe. Warsaw has declared its own intentions to completely cut off imports of Russian gas, and has also supported boosting Ukraine’s position as the main gas transit hub in Eastern Europe as well.

Faltering German support would cause Nord Stream 2 to completely unravel, with the pipeline’s construction already struggling to reach completion in the face of U.S. sanctions. Construction of the pipeline has been suspended since December 2019 following the implementation of U.S. sanctions targeting pipe-laying vessels. Russia’s natural gas giant Gazprom has been trying to resume activity with its own vessel, but the potential for expanded U.S. sanctions on other construction-related activities leaves an uncertain outlook. Germany, has continued to support the project, despite Washington’s sanctions, as well as disputes over the implementation of EU energy directives on the pipeline. But the combination of external pressure and domestic divisions could see Germany finally abandon that position, which would effectively leave Gazprom without a way to complete the pipeline.