Poland’s president has said that gas flows from Russia to Western Europe should never be restored, even if Russia and Ukraine reach a peace deal. Andrzej Duda told the BBC that the Nord Stream gas pipelines, which have not been used since 2022, “should be dismantled”.
He said that this would mean the likes of Germany would not be tempted to restore Russian supplies to boost its own struggling economy.
“I can only hope that European leaders will learn lessons from Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and that they will push through a decision to never restore the pumping of gas through this pipeline,” he said.
The Nord Stream gas pipelines were built by Russia’s gas giant Gazprom and run between Russia and northern Germany.
Nord Stream 1 was shut down in 2022 and Nord Stream 2 was never used, following the invasion of Ukraine.
Gas prices in Europe surged after the shutdown and, in recent months, politicians from Germany’s far right AfD party have suggested the Nord Stream gas pipes should resume operations.
Germany will hold federal elections at the end of February.
“I believe the Nord Stream pipelines should be dismantled”, Duda said. “This pipeline causes a very big threat to Ukraine, to Poland, to Slovakia but also to other Central European countries.”
It is a threat from the point of view of energy, from the point of view of the military but also it is a huge economic threat because it means a domination of Russia over Europe in the economic sense.
On the prospect of a deal between Ukraine and Russia now that US President Donald Trump has taken office, Duda insisted that no peace talks could take place without the participation of Ukraine.
The international community cannot agree, and it is unacceptable that Russia would take certain territories of Ukraine and keep them by force. This is unacceptable.
We must not let Russia win this war.
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