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The pulse between Germany and Russia over the case of Alexei Navalni hardened on Sunday with the ultimatum from Berlin which demands an explanation about the poisoning of the opponent before imposing eventual sanctions while Moscow accused Germany of delaying the investigation.
“Setting ultimatums doesn’t help anyone, but if in the next few days the Russian side does not contribute to clarify what has happened, then we will have to discuss a response with our partners ”, Heiko Maas, the German foreign minister, told the Bild daily.
If sanctions were decided, they would have to be “selective”, according to the minister.
In the evening, on the public television channel ARD, Maas considered that “it would be a mistake to exclude a priori” consequences for the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project between Russia and Europe.
“Emanation of the Russian State”
Navalni, the main Russian opponent, is currently hospitalized in Berlin.
According to the government of Angela Merkel, there is “unequivocal evidence” that he was poisoned in Russia during an election tour by a Novichok-type nerve agent, created in Soviet times for military purposes. Then he was transferred to Germany.
Berlin and other Western countries repeatedly urged Moscow to clear up the poisoning.
British Foreign Minister Dominic Raab said Sunday that it is “very difficult” to think of any other “plausible” explanation other than that of “an emanation of the Russian state.” It is “clear that the Novichok has been used,” he said on Sky News.
For her part, the spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zajárova, counterattacked: “Berlin is delaying the process of the investigation that demands Deliberately?”, Wrote for her part on Facebook.
For the head of German diplomacy, these comments are a “diversionary maneuver” by Moscow. “And I fear that we will have many more in the days to come,” he declared in ARD, assuring that he has already agreed in principle to a request for judicial cooperation by Russia to have access to the dossier, and that it is currently being examined by the Berlin prosecutor’s office.
Kremlin involvement
The minister directly implicated the Russian state in the poisoning. “There are several indications in this regard, that is the reason why the Russian side must react now,” Maas said.
“The deadly substance with which Navalni was poisoned was found in the past in the possession of the Russian authorities, only a small number of people have access to the Novichok and that poison was already used by the Russian services for the attack on the former agent [ruso] Sergei Skripal, ”said Maas.
On Thursday, the European Union’s head of diplomacy, Josep Borrell, already raised possible sanctions.
For his part, the head of German diplomacy does not rule out that the case affects the controversial Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project, which must supply Germany and Europe with Russian gas, a project that until now had the support of Germany.
Pipeline
With the poisoning of Navalni, Angela Merkel’s government is under pressure to review support for this project.
The United States and its President Donald Trump have been leading a campaign for several years to try to torpedo it and imposed sanctions on the companies involved in the work, currently paralyzed, despite European protests.
Until now, Chancellor Merkel always tried to separate the other issues of the project’s economic and energy interests, important to Germany. More than a hundred European companies, half of which are German, are associated with the gas pipeline.
However Nord Stream became a contentious issue in Germany among conservative candidates who aspire to succeed Merkel ahead of the legislative elections in late 2021.
Two of them, Friedrich Merz and the president of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Chamber of Deputies, Norbert Röttgen, asked to stop the gas pipeline so that Putin does not “continue with his policy.”
Another of the applicants, Armin Laschet, one of the favorites, asked for prudence and not to act “on reflex.”
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