Russia wants to supply 40 percent less gas through the Nord Stream pipeline. In addition, the Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny was taken from his current prison to an unknown location by Russian authorities. All voices and developments on the Ukraine war here in the ticker.
4.40 p.m .: The federal government wants to support the gas company Gazprom Germania with billions to prevent bankruptcy. This should ensure security of supply in Germany, the federal government announced on Tuesday in Berlin. According to information from government circles, the sum involved is between nine and ten billion euros. Aid is therefore planned via the state development bank KfW.
According to the federal government, Gazprom Germania GmbH is a key company for gas supply in Germany. The company, which has stumbled due to sanctions from the Russian side, is to be protected from insolvency with a loan: “With this approach, the federal government retains influence on this part of the critical energy infrastructure and prevents energy security from being endangered.”
At the beginning of April, the federal government took control of the German subsidiary of the Russian state-owned company Gazprom via the Federal Network Agency. The Federal Network Agency became a trustee. In mid-May, however, Russia imposed sanctions on Gazprom Germania and almost all of Gazprom Germania’s subsidiaries, causing the company to experience “financial difficulties,” according to the federal government.
The failure of gas deliveries as a result of the Russian sanctions and the resulting need to purchase replacements at currently very high market prices would have deteriorated Gazprom Germania’s financial situation to such an extent that the German government had to secure liquidity with a KfW loan. With the loan, the federal government wants to avert insolvency of the company and prevent subsequent effects on the market. The money is used to secure liquidity and to purchase replacement gas.
The fiduciary management of Gazprom Germania via the Federal Network Agency is also to be secured in the longer term, beyond September. For this purpose, the trust administration is to be placed on a new legal basis. Gazprom Germania is also renamed “Securing Energy for Europe GmbH”. This should send a clear signal to the market that the aim of the measures taken is to secure the energy supply in Germany and Europe. The federal government is examining ways of converting the loan into equity in order to ensure security of supply in the long term. That would mean that the state would step into the company.
3.30 p.m .: The federal government currently sees the security of supply for gas in Germany as further guaranteed. A spokeswoman for the Federal Ministry of Economics said on Tuesday in response to the fact that the Russian energy giant Gazprom reduced the maximum gas delivery volumes through the Nord Stream 1 Baltic Sea pipeline to Germany by 40 percent. “We are monitoring the situation and examining the facts,” said the spokeswoman. Gazprom had cited delays in repair work by Siemens as the reason. For Germany, Nord Stream 1 is the main supply pipeline with Russian gas.
3:20 p.m .: Chancellor Olaf Scholz supports the attempt to make the sanctions against Russian oligarchs more effective with a whistleblower hotline. “Russia’s aggression against Ukraine has shown that sanctions urgently need to be more effective – especially against Russian oligarchs and their hidden assets,” Scholz said at an event organized by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an international body dedicated to combating and preventing money laundering . A second law on the enforcement of sanctions will be passed shortly, which will, among other things, provide for a national register for assets that are subject to sanctions or whose origin is unclear. “We will also set up a special hotline for whistleblowers,” announced the Chancellor.
2.30 p.m .: The Kremlin critic and opposition activist Alexei Navalny has been removed from his current prison by Russian authorities and taken to an unknown location. This is reported by Navalny’s office manager Leonid Volkov on Telegram and the writer Kira Jarmysch on Twitter.
“We don’t know where Alexei is now and to which detention colony he is being taken,” Volkov wrote. However, it is suspected that Navalny was transferred to a penal colony with much stricter prison conditions. In March, the opposition politician was sentenced by a court to another nine years He was sentenced to imprisonment. He is said to have misused millions of dollars in donations for personal gain, the court said. The West and Navalny’s foundation accused Russia of a politically motivated show trial. Navalny’s appeal was dismissed in May.
2:20 p.m .: Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) is expected in Ukraine on Thursday and is planning a visit program scheduled for around six hours. The daily mirror learned this from a reliable source. French President Emmanuel Macron and Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi are also to travel to Kyiv as expected, and Romanian President Klaus Johannis could also take part in the visit, it said. After arrival, several meetings are planned from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m., most notably a lengthy meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
1:59 p.m .: According to information from “Bloomberg”, Ukraine will ask Europe for temporary grain storage to secure the next harvest. Deputy Minister of Agriculture of Ukraine Markian Dmitrasevich said that Russian attacks and occupation of areas in eastern and southern Ukraine reduced the country’s grain storage capacity by 15 million tons. Thanks to its black earth, a very fertile soil, Ukraine is considered one of the largest grain producers in the world.
1:02 p.m .: Russia is reducing gas deliveries via the Nord Stream Baltic Sea pipeline to Germany by a good 40 percent. The energy company Gazprom announced on Tuesday that only 100 million cubic meters of gas could be transported per day instead of the usual 167 million cubic meters. The background is missing parts that should have been delivered by the German Siemens group.
In the past few weeks, Russia has already completely turned off the gas supply to countries such as Poland, Bulgaria, Finland, the Netherlands and Denmark. However, this was justified by the fact that the countries do not pay for the deliveries in rubles. Putin demanded this payment method through an account at Gazprombank, which converts euros and dollars into rubles, in response to Western sanctions.
The Nord Stream 1 pipeline runs from Vyborg in Russia through the Baltic Sea to Lubmin in Germany near Greifswald. According to the Russian agency TASS, in 2020 the pipeline had a gas transport volume of 59.2 billion cubic meters.
12:29 p.m .: On Monday evening, Ukrainian President Selenskyj increased the pressure on Chancellor Olaf Scholz in an interview with ZDF. In the “heute journal” Selenskyj accused the Chancellor of still showing too much consideration for Russia.
Selenskyj expressed clear criticism of Chancellor Scholz. Although “relationships between the German and Ukrainian governments are by no means bad,” the President said: “We need Chancellor Scholz to assure us that Germany will support Ukraine. He and his government have to make a decision: no balancing act should be attempted between Ukraine and relations with Russia.”
Now, of all people, the brother of Kiev’s mayor Vitali Klitschko, boxing legend Wladimir, contradicts him. “Especially before the Federal Chancellor’s visit to Kyiv, we should have no doubts about one thing: Germany was, is and will always be a partner of Ukraine,” emphasized Klitschko in an interview with the “Bild” newspaper. And he becomes even clearer: “There can be no two opinions on this.”
Back in April, Klitschko countered Selenskyj when President Steinmeier had been uninvited.
11:35 a.m .: In the run-up to Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s visit to Kyiv, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyj calls on his international partners in the weekly newspaper “Zeit”: “We have to do a lot more together to win this war.” Zelenskyj says his The country needs a lot more modern artillery pieces: “Now it’s still the case in many places on the front that the Russians can shoot down our positions with their artillery from a great distance without us being able to shoot back. So we need, for example, multiple rocket launchers with a longer range and similar systems.” Ukraine must win, the President replies in an interview: “Whatever the wording, dozens of people die here in Ukraine every day. Every day. How am I supposed to stay calm? Putin hates the idea of a free and united life in Europe, and we are against it. So say what you want and how you want it, but help us. Please.”
10.47 a.m .: The German Farmers’ Association complains of massive increases in costs for farmers and therefore expects further increases in food prices. “Fertilizer costs four times as much, feed costs twice as much, and diesel is almost unaffordable,” Farm President Joachim Rukwied told NDR Info on Tuesday. “We farmers simply need higher prices to be able to produce at all.”
He assumes that prices will continue to rise, at least in the near future, added the President of the German Farmers’ Association. Federal Agriculture Minister Cem Özdemir (Greens) also expects further price increases for food and suggests reducing VAT on certain food products. The effects of the Ukraine war on the global agricultural markets are a central topic at the German Farmers’ Day in Lübeck, to which Özdemir is also expected.
10:15 a.m.: Lithuania buys 18 howitzers from France. The Caesar Markt II howitzers would “significantly strengthen Lithuania’s defense capabilities,” Lithuanian Defense Minister Arvydas Anusauskas said on Twitter on Monday. France confirmed the purchase agreement. Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine has raised fears in Lithuania and the other small Baltic states that Russia might attack them too.
NATO and EU member Lithuania is currently upgrading its arsenal of weapons because of the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine. The government wants to increase its defense budget for 2022 by another 300 million euros.
5:51 a.m .: French President Emmanuel Macron is traveling to neighboring Romania and Moldova in view of the war in Ukraine. According to the Élysée Palace, Macron wanted to leave for Romania early Tuesday morning and then continue to Moldova on Wednesday. Both countries are concerned with the threat posed by the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine. Another topic is the desire of Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia to join the European Union. At the EU summit on June 23rd and 24th, the EU states want to position themselves on the candidate status of the three countries.
Tuesday, June 14, 4:25 a.m.: Former Ukrainian football coach Andrei Shevchenko considers his country a valuable potential member of the European Union against the background of the Russian invasion. Ukraine pays a very high price to prove itself as a worthy member of the European family, the former national player said in an interview with the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”. “The fact is: Ukraine defends the democratic values of the EU – and freedom. My country deserves to be part of a big European family and believe me: my country has a huge potential to strengthen the EU,” he stressed.
The day Russia started the war in Ukraine “was the worst day of my life,” said the 45-year-old. The former striker – who played for AC Milan and Chelsea among others – still does not want to return to his country to fight there. He thought about it a lot, but then after many discussions with former world boxing champions Vitali and Wladimir Klitschko, among others, decided to collect funds for humanitarian aid abroad. “Everyone has their place: one at the front, others in other places. I believe I’m doing the right thing,” he said.
11:26 p.m .: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy expects the European Union to grant his country candidate status this June. He would like Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) to personally support Ukraine’s EU membership, said Selenskyj on Monday in an interview with ZDF’s “heute journal”. Selenskyj added critically that in the time before Scholz took office, i.e. during the chancellorship of Angela Merkel (CDU), “a certain skepticism” prevailed in Germany’s political leadership with regard to his country’s accession to the EU and NATO.
During a visit to Kyiv at the weekend, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced that she would complete the analysis of Ukraine’s EU membership application at the end of next week. In any case, the recommendation of your authority should be linked to reforms. The EU countries must then unanimously decide how to proceed. This is to happen at an EU summit on June 23rd and 24th.
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