The German coalition put to the test by soaring gas prices

Correspondent in Berlin

Since the morning of Wednesday August 31, and for the second time in two months, the Russian gas extracted from Siberia no longer flows into the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline, one of the main energy arteries leading to Germany and Europe, for a minimum of three days. As usual, Gazprom justifies this shutdown by maintenance work, made necessary according to the Kremlin by the “European sanctions” disrupting turbine maintenance. Berlin accuses Russia of practicing a “energy blackmail”. Just like Engie in France, German energy companies are reduced to buying their stocks on the markets at exorbitant prices.

Maintenance work on Nord Stream needs to be done “every thousand hours”, the Russian giant announced on Wednesday, de facto imposing a new schedule on its customers. The last interruption, this summer, which had lasted ten days, was motivated by annual maintenance work, which has become routine since the commissioning of…