BERLIN — A leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party said Russian President Vladimir Putin’s Russia doesn’t pose a threat to his country — but that Poland potentially does. The comments, which echo Kremlin messaging, come at a time when centrist German politicians are increasingly warning that the AfD is using its rising influence to act as a mouthpiece for Putin inside Germany — a claim AfD leaders strongly deny. Putin “hasn’t done anything to me,” Tino Chrupalla, the co-leader of the AfD, said on German public television. “I don’t see any danger to Germany from Russia at the moment.” Chrupalla went on to insist that any country can potentially pose a threat to Germany. “Take Poland, for example,” Chrupalla said, citing the country’s refusal to extradite a Ukrainian citizen German authorities suspect of sabotaging the Nord Stream gas pipelines in 2022. “Poland can also be a threat to us.” German centrists are increasingly portraying the AfD as a party that represents Russian interests from inside Germany, with some going so far as to argue the Kremlin is taking advantage of the party’s access to official information for espionage. Marc Henrichmann, the conservative chairman of the Bundestag’s intelligence oversight committee, said he believes that Russia is doing exactly this. “Russia is naturally exerting its obvious influence in parliament, especially in the AfD, in order to spy and obtain sensitive information,” Henrichmann recently told German newspaper Handelsblatt. “The AfD is gratefully allowing itself to be used for this betrayal by Putin.” Chrupalla has forcefully pushed back against those accusations. “They accuse us of things they can never prove, and I find that perfidious,” he said during the talk show. Chrupalla’s comments come as AfD leaders are enmeshed in an internal dispute over a group of party politicians who were planning a trip to Russia to attend an international conference of the BRICS countries in Sochi, Russia. The AfD’s other co-leader, Alice Weidel — who has sought to polish the AfD’s image, rein in some of its most overt pro-Russian politicians and has sought closer relations to the Donald Trump administration in the U.S. — has attempted to stop the politicians from attending, signaling a growing rift inside her party over just how far support for Russia should go. “We shouldn’t continue like this,” she told reporters in the Bundestag on Tuesday. “We can’t afford it, and we don’t want to.”

Listen on * Spotify * Apple Music * Amazon Music Ein Blick zurück auf zwei Jahrzehnte deutscher Russlandpolitik. Katja Gloger und Georg Mascolo, Autoren des Buches Das Versagen, sprechen mit Gordon Repinski über Fehleinschätzungen, Verflechtungen und verpasste Warnsignale. Von den Anfängen in Dresden über Putins Rede im Bundestag bis hin zu Nord Stream und der Annexion der Krim . Ein Gespräch über politische Naivität, wirtschaftliche Interessen und die Lehren aus der Ära Merkel. Warum glaubte die Bundesregierung so lange an Wandel durch Annäherung? Welche Rolle spielten Schröder, Merkel und die deutsche Industrie? Und warum konnte Putin bis zuletzt sicher sein, dass er mit Deutschland immer wieder ins Geschäft kommt? Ein analytischer, schonungsloser Rückblick auf die deutsche Russlandpolitik – und die Frage, ob Berlin diesmal wirklich gelernt hat. Das Berlin Playbook als Podcast gibt es jeden Morgen ab 5 Uhr. Gordon Repinski und das POLITICO-Team liefern Politik zum Hören – kompakt, international, hintergründig. Für alle Hauptstadt-Profis: Der Berlin Playbook-Newsletter bietet jeden Morgen die wichtigsten Themen und Einordnungen. Jetzt kostenlos abonnieren. Mehr von Host und POLITICO Executive Editor Gordon Repinski: Instagram: @gordon.repinski | X: @GordonRepinski.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk warned that the end of Russia’s war in Ukraine might lead to efforts to rekindle economic ties with Russia — including the restarting of the controversial Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline. As Europe faces the possibility of peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, Tusk described calls by European politicians to rebuild ties to Moscow at the eventual end of the war as “an alarm bell.” “[I know] it means that someone in Europe wants to restore Nord Stream 2, to have good business with oil and gas from Russia, and so on,” he said. “For me, it’s always like an alarm bell,” Tusk said in an interview with the Sunday Times. A major pipeline transporting gas from Russia to Germany via the Baltic Sea, Nord Stream 2 is described by critics as a strategic mistake and a symbol of Europe’s appeasement to Moscow. The pipeline was blown up in 2022 after the start of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. A Ukrainian professional diver was later arrested over his suspected involvement in the sabotage. “The problem with North Stream 2 is not that it was blown up. The problem is that it was built,” Tusk wrote on X social media earlier this month. In the Sunday Times interview, Tusk said that a Polish court ruling blocking a German extradition request for one of the suspects in the Nord Stream sabotage means that Ukraine has a right to attack Russia-linked targets anywhere in Europe. The Polish leader also berated Europe’s complacency and its constant underrating of Putin’s expansionist threats. “We are talking about the end of the era of illusions in Europe — too late, I’m afraid. Too late to be well prepared for all the threats, but not too late to survive,” Tusk said. Also in the interview, Tusk described Britain’s exit from the EU as “one of the biggest mistakes in our [shared European] history”— 10 years after U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron’s ill-fated attempt to use the Brexit referendum as leverage to extract concessions from the EU. “And today I think it’s much more visible,” said Tusk, who was well-steeped in the first phase of the Brexit negotiations as president of the European Council at the time.  “Especially after Brexit, Poles realized that the objective situation in the U.K. is not much better than in Poland. I also know that Brits are starting to leave the U.K. and begin a life here in Poland,” he said.

BERLIN — The former German chancellor remains unrepentant. During a recent stop in Hungary to promote her memoir, “Freedom,” Angela Merkel suggested Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine could have been avoided. If only there had been no Covid pandemic, she said, if only Eastern European leaders hadn’t once refused talks with Vladimir Putin, the Russian president may not have ordered the invasion. Coming at a time when Europe is wrestling with how to counter Russia’s escalating aggression, Merkel’s comments highlight her willingness to brush off strident criticism — especially out of Eastern Europe — of Germany’s historic failure to grasp the threat posed by Moscow. Leaders in the countries most exposed to Moscow accuse her of having turned a blind eye to Putin’s provocations in pursuit of a strategy of economic rapprochement that collapsed in 2022 when Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine anew. Notably absent from Merkel’s comments was a critical analysis of what many see as her own decisive failures in Germany’s dealings with Putin during her 16-year reign. Instead, Merkel suggested Putin could have been reasoned with if the Europeans had had a little more luck and determination. “Would Putin have invaded Ukraine if it hadn’t been for Covid?” Merkel asked during an interview with a Hungarian journalist. “No one can say for sure,” she added, echoing an argument she also makes in her book. “If you can’t meet face-to-face, if you can’t settle differences of opinion eye-to-eye, then you can’t find new compromises.” Merkel went on to suggest that the unwillingness of Eastern European countries — namely the Baltic states and Poland — to agree to negotiate with Putin in 2021, when Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron floated the possibility of a summit meeting between European leaders and the Russian president, may have also contributed to the invasion. “It did not come to fruition, and then I left office, and then Putin’s aggression began,” Merkel said of the summit proposal. Merkel’s comments outraged Ukrainian and Eastern European leaders, who long before Russia’s full-scale invasion had repeatedly warned German leaders of Putin’s aggressive intentions and imperial ambitions, though that message often fell on deaf ears. One high-ranking Ukrainian official told POLITICO that Merkel’s comments are “unacceptable and frankly sick.” Putin’s propagandists and the pro-Kremlin media, on the other hand — normally no supporters of Merkel — were largely delighted. The ex-chancellor’s comments fit nicely into the Kremlin’s narrative that the West is the true aggressor. “Merkel admitted the obvious: She revealed who in the West provoked the Ukrainian conflict,” ran one headline in a pro-Kremlin Russian tabloid. FALL FROM GRACE Merkel’s reluctance to reckon with the sharp criticism of her country’s historic Russia policy reveals just how deeply rooted some old German attitudes toward Moscow remain. During Merkel’s 16 years in office, German policy toward Russia was defined by the slogan “Wandel durch Handel,” or “change through trade.” Economic interdependence with Russia, the thinking went, would help ensure peace in Europe, while also being very good for German business. A key manifestation of that policy was the Nord Stream pipelines, built to bring Russian gas directly to Germany through the Baltic Sea. | Sean Gallup/Getty Images A key manifestation of that policy was the Nord Stream pipelines, built to bring Russian gas directly to Germany through the Baltic Sea. In 2014, even after Russia sent “little green men” into parts of Ukraine and annexed Crimea, German officials backed the plan to create the second such pipeline (the first was completed in 2011). They did so despite warnings from Eastern European leaders that Germany was following a policy of appeasement in the face of ever-clearer Russian imperialism. After Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, many German leaders admitted that their approach to Russia had been a failure — and that their purchase of cheap Russian gas, in the end, did a lot to finance Putin’s war machine. “We held on to bridges that Russia no longer believed in, and that our partners warned us about,” German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said at the time. Many in Eastern Europe in particular see the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, in the first year of the war, as a rightful refutation of Merkel’s outreach to Russia. “The problem with North Stream 2 is not that it was blown up,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said on Facebook Tuesday. “The problem is that it was built.” But it appears to be too difficult for Merkel — once lauded as the “chancellor of the free world” when Time Magazine named her “Person of the Year” in 2015 — to accept that history may end up judging her far more critically. “I believe we really have a growing problem here with Merkel’s loss of touch with reality, as I would describe it, and her attempt to influence her own history, her own role in history,” said Stefan Meister of the German Council on Foreign Relations. “In my opinion, this makes her untrustworthy. She is discrediting herself.” While current Chancellor Friedrich Merz has pivoted from his country’s past policies and led much of the European effort to aid Ukraine, Merkel’s unwillingness to face up to Germany’s mistakes has helped prevent a broader national reappraisal of the country’s role in the lead-up to the war, according to Meister. Inside Germany — and in particular in the former East Germany, where Merkel was raised — there remains considerable sympathy for Putin. Parties like the far-right Alternative for Germany, currently leading in many polls, and the populist-left Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht take a far more conciliatory approach to Moscow. Some Russia-friendly forces in Germany are seizing on Merkel’s interview to blame NATO for sabotaging peace efforts. But even in Russia, some mocked Merkel’s assertion that more talks, by 2021, could have changed Putin’s plans. “Anyone reasonably informed has long known that the disagreements between Russia and the West at that moment were already too deep,” Alexei Chesnakov, a former adviser to the Kremlin, wrote in an online post. Eva Hartog, Nette Nöstlinger and Veronika Melkozerova contributed reporting.

BERLIN — German prosecutors announced Thursday the arrest of a Ukrainian national suspected of helping coordinate the 2022 sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines. The federal prosecutor general said Italian police detained Serhii K. overnight in Rimini using a European arrest warrant. He is accused of being one of the organizers of an operation that placed explosives on the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines near the Danish island of Bornholm in September 2022. The blasts caused massive gas leaks and severely damaged both pipelines, cutting a crucial energy link between Russia and Europe. Investigators believe the group used a yacht rented from the German port of Rostock under false identities to transport explosives to the site. Traces of the military-grade explosive octogen were later discovered on board. According to German authorities, Serhii K. was “urgently suspected” of coordinating the attack alongside others. He faces charges of causing an explosion, committing anti-constitutional sabotage, and destroying infrastructure. The arrest marks a breakthrough in a complex investigation that has stretched across several countries. Sweden and Denmark closed their probes without naming suspects earlier this year, while Germany pressed ahead with its case, focusing on a small team of divers and support staff thought to have carried out the mission. Reports from Western officials have pointed to possible links with Ukrainian networks, though Kyiv has consistently denied any involvement. The suspect will be transferred to Germany to face a federal judge in Karlsruhe.

RUSSIAN OIL OR MASS LAYOFFS: A GERMAN TOWN’S CONUNDRUM In Schwedt, life flows through an oil refinery. If it doesn’t get help — or restart Russian imports — people worry their jobs will be gone. By VICTOR JACK, JOHANNA SAHLBERG and BEN LEFEBVRE in Schwedt, Germany Chimneys of the PCK refinery and other companies in the Schwedt industrial park. | Wolfram Steinberg/picture alliance via Getty Images Annekathrin Hoppe’s town, her community, the people she oversees as mayor, are losing their lifeline. Many now fear their jobs are next. They say a bit of Russian oil could change that.  In Schwedt, life flows through a partly Russian-owned oil refinery. The sprawling plant provides a living for around a fifth of the city’s 30,000 residents. Hoppe once worked there before becoming mayor. It’s been the community’s beating heart for six decades.  “The refinery is the reason the town exists,” Hoppe said, sitting in a spartan second-floor office overlooking the neat rows of the pale Plattenbau apartment blocks that once dominated Soviet-controlled East Germany.  Yet like those apartment blocks, the refinery may soon become a relic of the past. In late 2022, the plant lost its steady Russian energy diet when the aptly named Druzhba (Friendship) pipeline abruptly dried up due to sanctions. Moscow’s oil was no longer welcome after Russia invaded Ukraine. The plant has yet to recover. And Hoppe is now appealing to Berlin for action — even if it means bringing back Russian oil. After the war broke out, Berlin put the refinery under a temporary trusteeship, seizing Russian firm Rosneft’s majority stake. But Rosneft still owns its shares. | Fabian Sommer/picture alliance via Getty Images “It is so difficult for people and for all of us here in Schwedt to accept this new economic reality,” said the center-left politician. “Of course we don’t accept the war,” she added, but “traditionally we have always had good relations with Russia,” echoing a sentiment felt across eastern Germany. Her pleas showcase Europe’s growing conundrum. All over the continent, a bubbling chorus of business leaders and politicians is urging governments to revisit their hard-line stances on Moscow as ceasefire talk hangs in the air and economic anxiety mounts.  Standing in the way are a raft of legal and political hurdles. Officials in Berlin, Brussels and elsewhere are putting up walls, even pushing new plans to end the bloc’s reliance on Moscow for good. But that reserve won’t necessarily hold if political sentiment shifts, the fighting ceases, and struggling industries start demanding access to cheaper Russian energy. For the first time in years, “the potential for restarting or increasing Russian supplies again seems like a possibility,” said Jonathan Stern, a Russia specialist and founder of the gas program at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, a research organization that receives money from fossil fuel firms and governments. BACKWARD FLOW Shortly after Vladimir Putin’s troops marched toward Kyiv, the EU slapped sanctions on Moscow’s key economic lifeline, fossil fuels. Three years later, the continent has nearly unwound its own long-held reliance on Russian energy. Gas pipeline imports are down by two-thirds, and oil and coal shipments by sea are banned. Enter Donald Trump.  The returning president’s vow to end the fighting has given oxygen to EU voices arguing that a ceasefire could presage a return to Russian energy. Europe’s economic stagnation, and gas and power prices still at double prewar levels, are adding still more fuel to that fire. The bloc’s far-right forces, from Austria’s Freedom Party to Bulgaria’s Revival, have long called for restarting supplies from Moscow. But now mainstream politicians, including Italy’s energy minister and officials from Germany’s ruling center-right, are also refusing to rule it out. Even Ukraine’s sanctions envoy said it would be “stupid” not to eventually restart imports. Europe’s energy sector is keen, too. In France alone, energy firms TotalEnergies and Engie have said Europe could eventually up Russian gas buys by 40 percent. “There are definitely companies out there who would take it,” said one gas trader, granted anonymity to discuss the politically charged topic. It has become “common sense that if there is peace, then gas will come.” In Germany — the nucleus of Europe’s economic slump — the debate is crescendoing. Politicians from both the ruling Social Democrats and Christian Democrats have debated reviving the Russia-to-Germany Nord Stream pipelines, which were destroyed in 2022, although Friedrich Merz is now pushing to sanction the subsea links.  Protesters, including workers from the nearby PCK oil refinery, demand an end to the embargo of Russian oil imports in 2022. | Christian Ender/Getty Images A spokesperson for Germany’s economy ministry said the country had “set itself the goal of becoming independent of Russian oil as quickly as possible — and has successfully achieved this.” But “pressure will definitely grow,” said Stefan Meister of the German Council on Foreign Relations, as “more voices from different companies, but also from politicians on the local level … demand returning to cheap Russian oil and gas.” Secluded and nestled between a dense thicket of trees on the edge of town, the Schwedt refinery encapsulates that shift. Responsible for supplying over 90 percent of Berlin’s oil, its giant airport and a network of businesses from paper mills to pipeline processors, the facility is facing a battery of difficulties. With its Russian imports gone, the site now operates at 80 percent capacity and receives oil from Germany’s Rostock pipeline, Poland’s Gdańsk port and Kazakhstan via Druzhba.  That leaves the refinery “in the red,” given the site’s fixed running costs, according to Danny Ruthenberg, who heads the facility’s works council. Last month, the government extended an employment guarantee at the facility until the end of the year, giving its workers temporary respite. But within the next two years, up to 1,000 jobs will be at risk, Ruthenberg claimed. Russian energy could prevent that. Plus, Ruthenberg said, it “doesn’t require any [new] investment.”  Danny Ruthenberg, the head of the refinery’s works council, worries about looming job cuts at the facility. | Victor Jack/POLITICO “When peace is there again, then you have to trade with Russia,” he added. The PCK consortium, which owns the refinery, didn’t respond to a request for comment from POLITICO.  POLITICS OVER LAW But bringing Moscow back into the fold won’t be easy — even if the barriers remain more political than legal. For Schwedt, plugging the tangled metallic mesh of pipelines, distillation units and towering chimneys back into Moscow’s oil pump first means dealing with its convoluted legal structure. After the war broke out, Berlin put the refinery under a temporary trusteeship, seizing Russian firm Rosneft’s majority stake. But Rosneft still owns its shares. Any attempt to restart supplies from Moscow would therefore require the EU to lift its oil embargo, Poland to accept Russian crude passing through its pipeline network and Germany to force Rosneft to sell its shares to banks and suppliers on board, said Tibor Fedke, a senior energy lawyer at the Noerr law firm. A protester in Schwedt wears a hard hat with the writing “PCK” and an image of Russian President Vladimir Putin, in 2022. | Omer Messinger/Getty Images After that, signing new legal contracts would be “in theory very, very easy,” he said. While the new owner would still have to convince other shareholders and suppliers that they would not be hurt by future sanctions, it’s largely “a political matter,” Fedke added. The story is similar for Nord Stream. European backers of the pipelines, which lie shattered deep under the Baltic Sea, have demanded that Russia’s Gazprom iron out its legal disputes before revival talk seriously begins. Germany’s regulator must also approve the flow of Moscow’s gas.  “Assuming there’s political will,” said Stern, the gas expert, that signoff can be done overnight, he said. The physical fix could be done in “months,” he added.  Ukraine is the other potential postwar path for Russian gas to reenter the EU, Stern said. Pipelines criss-crossing Ukraine once carried half of Moscow’s exports to Europe. But those flows ended in January after Kyiv let a transit deal with Moscow expire. “I think if we saw a meaningful ceasefire, we might see traders from all over asking Gazprom: ‘Will you sell us gas on the Ukrainian border … where we’ve got people who’ll buy it?’” he said.  The crude oil processing control center on the premises of PCK. | Patrick Pleul/picture alliance via Getty Images Elsewhere, countries like the Czech Republic have upgraded oil pipeline infrastructure to ensure their refineries are supplied with non-Russian fuels. But that doesn’t lock them into those alternatives.   “Logistically, it wouldn’t be an issue at all,” said Homayoun Falakshahi, head of crude analysis at Kpler, a commodities firm that tracks global oil shipping. “It would be very, very easy to switch back to Russian crude” — whether it arrives by ship or pipeline.  CREAKING CENTER So far, mainstream politicians have stayed resolute on ending Russian imports. Germany’s Merz in May vowed to ensure “that Nord Stream 2 cannot be put back into operation,” even backing fresh EU sanctions on the pipelines for good measure. The EU, too, is steaming ahead with plans to quit Russian supplies. Brussels last month proposed legislation to fully phase out Moscow’s gas imports by 2027. “It’s quite clear that we have already learned the lesson that dependency on energy imports from Russia is not without a price,” Lithuanian Energy Minister Žygimantas Vaičiūnas told POLITICO. “So sooner or later, we are paying the price for that.” “We’re not going back,” echoed one EU official, speaking anonymously to discuss the sensitive subject. Even a ceasefire in Ukraine is not equivalent to a “long-term peace,” the official added. Patrick Pleul/picture alliance via Getty Images But achieving that is far from a given. There’s legal uncertainty about Brussels’ gas-quitting legislation, while countries such as Austria, Slovakia and Hungary want to leave the door open for Russian imports. At the same time, Budapest and Bratislava are constantly threatening to tank the EU’s Russia sanctions in retaliation. Meanwhile, the Kremlin has hollowed out a Western price cap on Russian oil, selling its oil via an army of creaky tankers with opaque ownership. Additionally, an EU offer in 2022 to spend €2 billion on helping plants pivot away from Russian energy has come to little, at least in the bloc’s most heavily dependent countries of Slovakia and Hungary.  That missing money is being felt in Schwedt. The German government once pledged €400 million to upgrade Germany’s Rostock oil pipeline and help Schwedt replace its Russian supplies. But Brussels never approved the new cash. “We’re disappointed,” said Ruthenberg, the refinery’s works council chief. “The chancellor promised money that never came.” Hoppe, the mayor, stressed she would rather see the refinery shun Russian oil — but the frozen funding might leave the city with little choice but to consider Moscow. “The new federal government and the EU must act together to start on the developments they promised,” she said.  Schwedt’s mayor, Annekathrin Hoppe, and the chairman of the municipal council, Hans-Joachim Höppner, want the new German government to secure previously promised funds for the refinery. | Victor Jack/POLITICO According to one senior German lawmaker, decisions about the refinery’s future are “still pending” in Berlin. “Ultimately, it is important that there are sustainable prospects for the site that will also secure jobs,” the lawmaker said, granted anonymity to discuss the process. A European Commission spokesperson said that the EU executive was “in close and constructive contact with the German authorities” on the funding, while declining to give further details. The German economy ministry spokesperson said that sales talks with Rosneft were “ongoing,” while discussions with Brussels over cash funding were still “underway.”  “Ensuring security of supply remains the top priority” regarding the refinery, the economy ministry spokesperson added.  In the meantime, political pressure is starting to boil. Flanked by two Russia-friendly parties — the vociferous Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht on the left and an ascendant far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) on the right — German centrist regional government leaders from Brandenburg to Saxony to Thuringia are cautiously backing a Russia return, said Meister, the political scientist. In the country’s east, especially, “you just have a very Russia-friendly society,” he said. “You cannot [pursue] a fully-fledged policy against this mood.” Many East Germans still see themselves as second-class citizens compared with the country’s more historically affluent West, according to recent polling, while Germans with Russian ethnic roots are almost twice as likely to support the AfD as their peers. A pensioner with a walker, in Schwedt. | Bildagentur-online/Schoening/Universal Images Group via Getty Images Behind closed doors, opponents fear a German volte-face could spark a domino effect. Three EU diplomats fretted that Italy, Austria, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic are all at risk of following suit on Russia if Germany caves.  A Bulgarian official said the country remains “fully aligned” with the EU’s strategy to quit Russian energy. “Austria does not comment on such speculations,” said a spokesperson for the country’s energy ministry. The Czech and Italian permanent representations in Brussels didn’t respond to a request for comment from POLITICO.   THE TRUMP CARD More powerful than those internal pressures is an external force: Trump. Despite his campaign pledge to end the bloodshed in Ukraine in “24 hours,” the U.S. president has struggled to make progress on a ceasefire. The former reality show star has wavered on further sanctions against Moscow, while heaping praise on the Russian leader and persistently backing closer economic ties with the Kremlin. “Russia wants to do largescale TRADE with the United States when this catastrophic ‘bloodbath’ is over, and I agree,” Trump wrote after a two-hour call with Putin in May. U.S. President Donald Trump nd German Chancellor Friedrich Merz meet at the Oval Office. | Pool photo by Chris Kleponis via Getty Images That debate is also firing up his administration. While White House special envoy Steve Witkoff wants to lift energy sanctions on Russia, according to two people familiar with the matter, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum would rather displace Moscow to make room for more U.S. imports. In any case, Europe’s energy sector is at the heart of that potential cooperation. Moscow is in talks with Washington over restarting Nord Stream, backed by U.S. investors. That’s sparking anxiety in Brussels. Trump and Putin “want to divide the European energy market and create [separate] spheres of influence,” said a second EU official, also granted anonymity.  Schwedt, too, could be swept into a U.S.-Russia peace deal. American investors are reportedly exploring buying up Rosneft’s shares in the refinery, according to German investigative outlet Correctiv. That would give U.S. firms a majority share in the facility. “In an alternate universe in which Russia makes peace with the West and Ukraine specifically, Schwedt would look a lot more appealing,” said Clayton Seigle, an energy analyst at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank. For locals, that solution is as good as any. “Americans are ultimately our friends,” said Ruthenberg, the refinery’s works council leader. If the U.S. “wants to invest here … we will no longer be at a standstill.” That does, of course, mean a Trump-branded partnership.  But “Trump is for a limited time,” Hoppe quipped with a chuckle. “We hope.”