Gazprom’s indefinite delay in resuming gas supplies will compound Europe’s problems with winter fuel supplies, with the cost of living already rising, driven by energy prices.
Nord Stream 1, which runs under the Baltic Sea to supply Germany and other countries, was due to resume operations after a three-day outage for maintenance at 01:00 GMT on Saturday, but the pipeline operator reported zero flows a few hours later.
Moscow has blamed sanctions, imposed by the West after Russia’s February 24 invasion of Ukraine, for hampering routine operations and maintenance of Nord Stream 1. Brussels and Washington accuse Russia of use gas as an economic weapon.
The United States said it was working with Europe to ensure sufficient supplies were available for the winter.
Finance ministers from the wealthy Group of Seven democracies – Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States – said Friday that a cap on the price of Russian oil was aimed at “reducing… Russia’s ability to finance its wars of aggression while limiting the impact of Russia’s war on world energy prices”.
The Kremlin – which calls the conflict a “special military operation” – has said it will stop selling oil to any country that enforces the cap.
NUCLEAR FEARS
In the first six months of the war, thousands of people were killed and Ukrainian towns reduced to rubble, and now there is the danger of a nuclear calamity.
A United Nations inspection team, led by its chief Rafael Grossi, braved intense shelling to reach the Zaporizhzhia factory on Thursday.
Grossi, after returning to the territory under Ukrainian control, said that the physical integrity of the plant had been repeatedly violated. On Friday, he said he planned to produce a report early next week and that two experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspection team would remain at the plant until further notice. long term.
A reactor at the site was reconnected to the Ukrainian grid on Friday, a day after it was shut down due to a bombardment near the site, Ukrainian nuclear company Energoatom said.
The site is on the southern bank of a huge reservoir on the Dnipro River, 10 km across the water from the Ukrainian positions.
Each side has accused the other of bombing near the facility, which is still operated by Ukrainian personnel and supplies more than a fifth of Ukraine’s peacetime electricity. Kyiv also accuses Russia of using it to protect its weapons, which Moscow denies. Russia has so far resisted international calls to withdraw troops from the plant and demilitarize the area.
Ukraine’s nuclear company said Russia barred the IAEA team from accessing the plant’s crisis center, where Kyiv says Russian troops are stationed, which would make an unbiased assessment difficult.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged the IAEA team to go further, despite the difficulties.
“Unfortunately, we haven’t heard the main thing from the IAEA, which is the call for Russia to demilitarize the station,” Zelenskiy said in a video posted on a forum in Italy.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Ukraine continued to use the weapons of its Western allies to bomb the plant. He dismissed claims from Kyiv and the West that Russia had deployed heavy weapons at the plant.
Several towns near the plant were shelled by Russia on Thursday, Zaporizhzhia regional council mayor Mykola Lukashuk said.
Rogov, the pro-Russian official, said Ukrainian forces shelled Enerhodar, the Russian-held town near the power plant. And he repeated accusations that Ukraine staged a commando-style raid on the station with speedboats on the river. Ukrainian officials dismissed this as a fabrication.
Reuters could not verify the reports from either party.
COUNTEROFFENSIVE
Elsewhere on the front lines, Ukraine this week launched an offensive to retake territories in southern Ukraine, mainly further up the Dnipro in neighboring Kherson province.
Both sides claimed battlefield successes in the early days of what Ukrainians see as a potential turning point in the war. Details have been scarce, with Ukrainian officials releasing little information.
The Ukrainian General Staff said on Friday that Russian forces had shelled dozens of towns and villages, including Kharkiv – Ukraine’s second-largest city – in the north and the Donetsk region in the east.