On 12 August the partners of Gazprom, the Russian state-controlled gas giant, within the Nord Stream II consortium announced their withdrawal from a joint venture designed to build the pipeline, after objections to the project were raised by the Polish Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK).
Although the pipeline does not go through Poland, the Poles had the right to rule on the project given that Gazprom’s western partners have assets in the country. Notwithstanding that Gazprom was quick to state construction would go ahead as planned while its European partners look at legal alternatives, the Polish decision acts as a major spanner in the works and casts the project’s realisation in doubt.
With Gazprom now simultaneously engaged in a costly game of Russian pipeline roulette in trying to build pipelines to north-western Europe, Turkey, south-eastern Europe and China, something has got to give writes Sijbren de Jong in his column for EUobserver.
The full article can be read here.
The article was also featured in ‘the Morning Vertical‘; Radio Free Europe’s daily Russia brief.
Photo credit: Lenny K Photography via Foter.com / CC BY
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