Germany halts approval of Nord Stream 2 pipeline from Russia over Ukraine

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz addresses a joint press conference with Ireland’s Prime Minister following talks at the Chancellery in Berlin on February 22, 2022. (Photo by John MACDOUGALL / POOL / AFP) (Photo by JOHN MACDOUGALL/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
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German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has stopped the progression of the controversial Nord Stream 2 pipeline following Moscow’s actions in eastern Ukraine.

Scholz announced a halt to the certification of the pipeline from Russia while speaking alongside Irish Prime Minister Micheal Martin in Berlin on Tuesday.

The pipeline, which would have increased European reliance on energy from Russia, has been a major source of contention in Europe and the United States for years.

“With regard to the latest developments, we need to reassess the situation also with regard to Nord Stream 2. It sounds very technocratic but it is the necessary administrative step in order to stop certification of the pipeline,” Scholz said.

Without undergoing the certification or approval process, the pipeline cannot start running. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin has recognized two separatist territories in eastern Ukraine as independent states, ordering the deployment of Russian troops there following a major address Monday night.

For almost eight years, the breakaway regions have been the site of a low-intensity war between Russian-backed separatists and Ukrainian forces, which has left more than 14,000 people dead.

But Putin’s decision to send forces into the area has raised fears about a broader war in Ukraine. Here’s a look at how the conflict started.

What’s the recent history in Donbas?

War broke out in 2014 after Russian-backed rebels seized government buildings in towns and cities across eastern Ukraine. Intense fighting left portions of the Donbas region’s eastern Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts in the hands of Russian-backed separatists. Russia also annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014 in a move that sparked global condemnation.

The separatist-controlled areas in Donbas became known as the Luhansk and the Donetsk People’s Republics. The Ukrainian government in Kyiv asserts the two regions are in effect Russian-occupied. The self-declared republics are not recognized by any government, other than Russia. The Ukrainian government refuses to talk directly with either separatist republic.

The Minsk II agreement of 2015 led to a shaky ceasefire agreement, and the conflict settled into static warfare along the Line of Contact that separates the Ukrainian government and separatist-controlled areas. The Minsk Agreements (named after the capital of Belarus where they were concluded) ban heavy weapons near the Line of Contact.

How has Russia stoked the conflict?

The separatists in Donbas have had substantial backing from Moscow. Russia has long maintained that it has no soldiers on the ground there, but US, NATO and Ukrainian officials say the Russian government supplies the separatists, provides them with advisory support and intelligence, and embeds its own officers in their ranks.

Moscow has also distributed hundreds of thousands of Russian passports to people in Donbas in recent years.

Western officials and observers have accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of attempting to establish facts on the ground by naturalizing Ukrainians as Russian citizens, a de facto way of recognizing the breakaway states. It also gives him a reason to intervene in Ukraine.

Source: CNN