The pressure in the Nord Stream pipelines is surprisingly falling. The federal government suspects attacks: the situation in the news ticker.
Update from Wednesday, September 28, 5:30 a.m.: According to an assessment by the Swedish government, the underwater explosions on the Nord Stream pipelines are due to sabotage. Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson said this at a press conference on Tuesday evening. Based on Swedish and Danish information, the conclusion is that it was probably an intentional act. “So it’s probably a question of sabotage,” she said. Swedish Defense Minister Peter Hultqvist said afterwards that they were ready to allocate military resources as needed. At the press conference, Prime Minister Andersson also referred to agreements with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen.
+++ 10.15 p.m.: According to the Danish government, the leaks on the Baltic Sea pipelines Nord Stream 1 and 2 from Russia to Germany are due to “deliberate actions”. The authorities’ clear opinion is that it was not an accident, said Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen on Tuesday evening, without commenting on possible causes.
Danish Energy and Climate Minister Dan Jörgensen said at a news conference the holes the gas is leaking through are “too big” to have a random cause. Although the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines are currently not in operation, they are filled with gas. Copenhagen assumes that it will take “at least a week” for the methane escaping from the pipes to be used up, Jörgensen said.
Nord Stream leaks: Habeck is reluctant to comment
+++ 8:51 p.m.: Economics Minister Habeck was reluctant to comment on the cause of the leaks in the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines. One does not want to speculate, since it must first be clarified how the damage occurred. Therefore, Germany is in close contact with the Danish authorities.
+++ 7.55 p.m.: According to information from mirror weeks ago, the USA warned the federal government of possible attacks on gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea. A corresponding tip from the US secret service CIA was received in Berlin in the summer. The federal government does not want to comment publicly on this.
The United States warned the federal government weeks ago of possible attacks on gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea. According to information from SPIEGEL, a corresponding tip from the US secret service CIA was received in Berlin in the summer.
+++ 7.52 p.m.: A NATO official said in Brussels that the military alliance was “closely monitoring the situation in the Baltic Sea.” The Federal Ministry of the Interior in Berlin said it was taking the damage to the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines “very seriously”. “We are in close contact within the federal government, with the German security authorities and with our Danish and Swedish partners.”
Nord Stream Pipelines: Sabotage by Russia?
+++ 5.46 p.m.: “A leak in three different places with such a great distance between them can only be the result of a deliberate act or sabotage,” Norwegian military scientist and naval officer Tor Ivar Strömmen told the news agency on Tuesday (September 27). AFP. At the same time, Russia is the only possible person responsible for him.
+++ 4.30 p.m.: There were apparently underwater explosions on the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines on Swedish and Danish territory. This is reported by the Swedish TV station SVT citing the National Center for Seismology. Accordingly, there were two strong explosions. “There is no doubt that these are blasts,” said Professor Björn Lund, a seismology expert at Sweden’s national seismic network. “You can see very clearly how the waves are bouncing from the bottom of the sea to the surface,” says Lund.
Footage taken from a Danish military helicopter confirms this. They show the exit points of three gas leaks on the Nord Stream pipelines. Expert Kritstoffer Böttzauw, Director of the Danish Energy Agency, told Danish media: “This is no small crack. It’s a really big hole.”
+++ 3.45 p.m.: Ukraine has also labeled the leaks found on Nord Stream pipelines as sabotage. It was a “terrorist attack,” said Mykhailo Podoliak, adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. It was “nothing more than a terrorist attack planned by Russia and an act of aggression against the EU,” he wrote on Twitter. Russia’s aim is to destabilize Europe in winter, especially in the energy sector. “The best response” to such a provocation is “tanks for Ukraine,” Podoliak said.
Nord Stream pipelines sabotaged? Poland speaks of “next level of escalation”
+++ 3 p.m.: Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki has said leaks in Nord Stream pipelines are due to sabotage. “We don’t yet know the details of what happened there, but we can clearly see that there was an act of sabotage,” Morawiecki said on the sidelines of a gas pipeline opening in Goleniow near Szczecin. The act of sabotage is “probably the next level of escalation that we are dealing with in Ukraine”.
+++ 1.45 p.m.: Two more leaks were apparently discovered in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline. The news agency reports Reuters. Gas is now escaping into the Baltic Sea, it said. The offshore lines of the Russian-owned gas pipeline have suffered “unprecedented” damage. The information cannot be independently verified.
+++ 12.30 p.m.: Russia has not ruled out sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines. “Now no variant can be ruled out,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. “Obviously there is a destruction of the line. And whatever the reason for that, until the time the results of the investigations come out, you can’t rule out any variant,” he said. The Russian government is “extremely concerned” about the sudden drop in pressure in the pipelines.
Update from Tuesday, September 27, 11:15 a.m.: According to the Danish authorities, a total of three leaks have been discovered on the two pipelines Nord Stream 1 and 2. The operators had previously reported a drop in pressure in the tubes. He reports that NDR.
Two of the three leaks found are on Nord Stream 1 northeast of the island of Bornholm, one on Nord Stream 2 southeast of the island. In the case of Nord-Stream 1, one leak is in Danish and the other in Swedish waters, in the case of Nord-Stream 2 in Danish, according to the Danish Energy Agency. Since none of the natural gas pipelines are currently in operation, the incidents currently have no impact on the energy supply in Europe.
First report from Tuesday, September 27, 8:30 a.m.: Berlin – An unusual drop in pressure has been measured in the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines in the past few days. The capacities fell unplanned. This is obviously not a coincidence, as the federal government suspects.
Of the daily mirror reports that the government is assuming targeted attacks on the pipelines. “We can’t imagine a scenario where this isn’t a targeted attack,” an anonymous person privy to the federal government’s and federal agencies’ assessment told the newspaper. “Everything speaks against a coincidence.”
Nord Stream Pipelines: Sudden Pressure Drop – Are Attacks Behind It?
Both the Federal Network Agency and the Federal Ministry of Economics said on Monday evening (September 26) that the reason for the pressure drop in the Nord Stream pipelines was not yet known. They are in contact with the relevant authorities, it said. Part of the planned investigations is probably an analysis of the seabed around the pipelines. Navy divers and submarines are used for this. To the daily mirror-According to the report, there are two possible scenarios to explain the unusual drop in pressure: According to this, both saboteurs could escape Russia as well as the Ukraine behind it. However, these are guesses. Neither of the two responsible governments has commented on this so far. (tu/mse with dpa/AFP)