It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Wednesday, September 28, 2022
House Sales Collapse as UK Lenders Withdraw Mortgage Offers
William Shaw, Jack Sidders and Charlie Wells Tue, September 27, 2022
Deals for house purchases are collapsing after lenders pulled mortgage offers in response to soaring interest rates.
Smaller lenders such as Kensington, Accord Mortgages and Hodge were among those to say they were withdrawing products Tuesday. That follows the decision by Lloyds Banking Group Plc -- the UK’s biggest mortgage provider -- on Monday to halt some offers, while Virgin Money UK Plc temporarily stopped offering home loans to new customers.
Major firms weighed in later Tuesday. HSBC Holdings Plc told brokers it was removing new mortgage products for the rest of the day while Nationwide Building Society announced that it was increasing rates across product ranges starting Wednesday. Banco Santander SA said it was removing some products and increasing rates on many others.
Jessica Anderson, a 33-year-old who works in publishing, was set to buy a house in Walthamstow, east London, with her husband until the seller pulled out last week.
“We’re in an uncertain position where we’re not sure whether it still stands,” she said, regarding the couple’s mortgage offer. “Since the approval there have been two interest rate increases.”
Traders are betting the Bank of England will raise its key interest rate to 5.9% by September next year, compared with 0.1% a year ago, sending home loan costs spiraling for the 1.8 million people who need to remortgage next year.
A series of unfunded tax cuts from new Chancellor of the Exchequer Kwasi Kwarteng has rocked the pound and UK gilts, and forced the BOE to issue an emergency statement pledging to lift rates “as much as needed” to control inflation.
Analysts at Credit Suisse said in a note that house prices “could easily fall 10% to 15%.”
Read More: Kwarteng Heads for a Tough Meeting With London’s Top Bankers
Some hopeful housebuyers have had their mortgage offers fall through, according to Loubie Vaughan, founder of estate agent FG Consultants. She said one buyer had £900,000 ($969,120) in cash to buy a £1.4 million house in Camden, north London, but that the deal is now in doubt.
“I told him to sit tight and see how it plays out,” she said. “There’s no point running around like headless chickens when we don’t know what’s going to happen.”
Vaughan added that she expects house prices to fall despite Kwarteng cutting stamp duty, a tax on housing transactions, last week. Property Log, an extension that tracks home price changes on portal Rightmove, said Monday saw the biggest number of price cuts it’s recorded since it began tracking them more than four years ago. Left Stranded
“There will obviously be people who are left stranded,” said Ray Boulger, a manager at loan broker John Charcol. “Some lenders have given no notice, and with some we are getting emails during the day saying rates are being pulled at 5 p.m. There will be undoubtedly be people in the process of securing their mortgage who will miss the boat.”
So-called “chains” of multiple house purchases, where each buyer is dependent on the sale of their existing home, may starting collapsing when any one of the deals falls through, Boulger added.
Between Friday morning and Tuesday morning the number of residential mortgage products on the UK market fell 9% to 3,596 from 3,961, according to data compiled by Moneyfacts Group Plc. Atom Bank has lifted its rates by 1% on some mortgage offers and withdrawn others.
Read More: ‘Naive’ UK Mini-Budget Threatens House Prices, Jim O’Neill Says
The systems at some lenders are unable to cope with a flood of applications because everyone is trying to fix in at current rates, said Andrew Montlake, managing director at mortgage broker Coreco. Bigger lenders are now being overwhelmed as other firms temporarily withdraw from the market.
“My nerves are shot,” said Hannah Fearn, 40, a freelance writer in south London and another hopeful housebuyer. “Our mortgage offer lasts until mid January and we have just put in another best and final offer but if we don’t get this particular house I’m not sure what we’ll do.”
It’s unclear what will happen to the market next. If the Bank of England leaves interest rates unchanged for two or three weeks then lenders will have more certainty and more mortgage products will return, said Geoffrey Yu, a senior strategist at Bank of New York Mellon Corp. in London. “But if the pound falls again there is a greater chance of a BOE reaction, and affordability will just decline further,” he said.
Pakistan’s 1st woman architect co-creates sustainable shelters with severe flood survivors
RILEY FARRELL Wed, September 28, 2022
Though Yasmeen Lari, co-founder of the disaster relief nonprofit Heritage Foundation of Pakistan, is no stranger to distress, she felt “devastated” by one recent photo, which captured a now-deceased mother’s birth as witnesses pulled her infant out of the muddy water.
Pakistan received over three times its usual rainfall in August, marking this storm as one of the area's deadliest natural disasters in five decades. The enormity of the tragedy, she said, requires a national paradigm shift toward solutions and away from “outsider handouts."
In the weeks since the flooding, Heritage Foundation of Pakistan, created in 1981, has provided 1,200 bamboo material sets to Sindh, one of the nation’s hardest-hit provinces.
By the end of August, Pakistan's minister of climate change said one-third of the country was under water -- an area with roughly 33 million people -- and the torrential downpour washed away communities, leaving people at risk of waterborne illnesses, drowning and malnutrition. PHOTO: Bank of Punjab Officials visiting Pono Village to provide loans to women’s committees for 100 family units on July 16. (Yasmeen Lari)
The government of Pakistan estimated the total losses to be worth upward of $40 billion from the flooding. Climate change will propel this extreme weather to continue wreaking havoc on Pakistan and the rest of the world, according to the World Meteorological Organization.
Often labeled Pakistan’s first woman architect, Lari, 81, had a storied career of designing commercial buildings, such as the Taj Mahal Hotel, the Finance and Trade Center and the Pakistan State Oil House Headquarters in Karachi. She retired in 2000, pursuing humanitarian architectural efforts that intersect Pakistani culture and low-carbon, pragmatic solutions, which she has called her “past life’s atonement.”
Experts are not needed to assemble Lari’s shelters, as the Heritage Foundation of Pakistan has released YouTube guides for those who need to quickly learn.
Lari differentiates her nonprofit from others by focusing on knowledge-sharing and finding ways for women to participate in their own livelihoods and autonomy.
Women in Pakistan, she said, have capabilities to create beauty and patterns, just as they were taught by their mothers and their mothers before them. A community member crafts matting from shelter materials in the Karigar village near Pono Markaz, an area designed for rehabilitation and livelihood opportunities for flood-affected communities in the southeastern Pakistan, on July 16, 2022.
(Yasmeen Lari / Heritage Foundation of Pakistan)
On the other hand, charity responses to Pakistan’s past disasters have been “alien to the terrain and to the people,” Lari said.
“Everything is co-created,” Lari said. “Our materials must provide social and ecological justice so that human life is at the forefront.”
Perhaps most importantly, Lari believes that empowerment is more effective than handouts. To emphasize her prioritization of dignity and maternal connection with Pakistan, she applied the metaphor of dastarkhwan, a name used across Central and South Asia referring to a traditional space where food is eaten.
“I link the project to a mother's dining room, which has cooked for the whole village,” Lari said. “Nobody is throwing bags of food rations at you, but the progress is done in a civilized manner.”
The affidavits were filed in Cincinnati as part of a lawsuit aimed at stopping the enforcement of Ohio’s strict new abortion law. Originally paused for two weeks, the enforcement delay will be extended to at least Oct. 12.
If true, the affidavits show that a 10-year-old from Columbus was not the only child or teen rape victim forced to leave the state. They also describe more than two dozen other instances in which the abortion law put women under extreme duress.
The descriptions include those of three women who threatened suicide. They also include two women with cancer who couldn’t terminate their pregnancies and also couldn’t get cancer treatment while they were pregnant.
Another three examples were of women whose fetuses had severe abnormalities or other conditions that made a successful pregnancy impossible. Even so, they couldn’t get abortions in Ohio.
And in three cases, debilitating vomiting was caused by pregnancy ‒ so bad in one case that a woman couldn’t get off the clinic floor. But neither could these women get abortions in Ohio, the affidavits said.
The documents were filed in the case Preterm-Cleveland v. Yost. Having already gotten a temporary order restraining enforcement of the abortion law ‒ Senate Bill 23 ‒ clinics across Ohio are now seeking a preliminary injunction.
In doing so, they’re arguing that SB 23 is so onerous that it violates women’s due process rights under the Ohio Constitution. Ohio abortion clinic workers: Patients threaten suicide, face delays
Gov. Mike DeWine signed the law in 2019, but it couldn’t be enforced until the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade on June 24. Many of the affidavits describe how, as soon as the decision overturning Roe was announced that Friday, work at Ohio clinics was thrown into chaos.
Ohio law had allowed abortions until 20 weeks of pregnancy. Now, with only limited exceptions for the life and the health of the mother, no abortions were allowed after fetal cardiac activity could be detected by ultrasound.
In the affidavits, clinic workers said that usually happens after five to six weeks of pregnancy ‒ a point at which as many as a third of women and girls don’t know they’re pregnant.
The new, much-earlier cutoff sent clinic workers scrambling.
“In the days after SB 23 took effect, we had to cancel over 600 appointments,” Dr. Sharon Liner, medical director of Planned Parenthood Southwest Ohio in Cincinnati, said in her affidavit.
Liner added, “We have had at least three patients threaten to commit suicide. Another patient said she would attempt to terminate her pregnancy by drinking bleach. Another asked how much vitamin C she would need to take to terminate her pregnancy.”
In July, 60% of patients at the clinic had to be turned away because fetal cardiac activity had been detected by the initial ultrasound, Liner said.
The Ohio law requires a 24-hour waiting period and a second negative ultrasound before an abortion can be performed. Because things are changing so quickly at that stage of development, another 16% of women whose fetuses had no cardiac activity during the first exam were turned away in July because it was detected in the second, Liner said.
“When we tell patients we cannot help them, they are extremely distressed, and all we can offer them is resources, information and emotional support,” Liner said in her affidavit, which was taken while SB 23 was still being enforced.
Ohio clinics have been referring patients who were ineligible for abortions here to clinics and hospitals in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Illinois and New York to get them.
Planned Parenthood of Greater Ohio and other organizations have announced stepped-up assistance to help patients get to those states. But many patients ‒ including at least one homeless woman ‒ said problems with things such as transportation, child care, poverty and getting time off work make the trips virtually impossible, according to the affidavits.
In July, when Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost was raising unfounded doubts about the existence of a 10-year-old rape victim, there was plenty of data indicating that the story was all too plausible. Raped Ohio teens forced to Michigan, Indiana for abortions
In 2021, Ohio’s Children’s Advocacy Centers saw 6,717 cases of sexual abuse against Ohioans between infancy and adulthood. And in 2020, the most recent year for which statistics are available, 571 girls aged 17 or younger received abortions in Ohio, according to the state department of health. Fifty-two of them ‒ or one a week ‒ were 14 or younger.
The affidavits filed in late August and early September by workers at abortion clinics provide further evidence that child and teen rape and subsequent pregnancy is a problem in Ohio. But so long as fetal cardiac activity is detected, SB 23 requires such victims to either have those babies or scramble out of state and try to find an abortion.
Dr. Adarsh E. Krishen, chief medical officer for Planned Parenthood of Greater Ohio, told of a minor who had been sexually assaulted and had to travel to Michigan for an abortion because of SB 23. Krishen’s organization operates clinics in Columbus and Cleveland.
“This patient experienced immense trauma from the assault itself and then endured further trauma from a forensic interview alongside a physical exam to collect evidence for the ongoing police investigation,” Krishen said in his affidavit. “This trauma was further exacerbated by needing to wait over three weeks for her appointment. In each step of this process she felt the complete denial of bodily autonomy and safety, something all people, especially children, should unequivocally have at all times.”
Another example shows how SB 23 makes police investigation of child and teen rapes more difficult.
Aeran Trick, operations manager of Women’s Med Center of Dayton, told of “a 16-year-old girl living in Southwestern Ohio who had become pregnant after being sexually assaulted by a family member.”
As with the 10-year-old from Columbus, Trick said this teenager was forced to go to Indianapolis for an abortion.
“The local Ohio law-enforcement agency ‒ which was already involved at the time the clinic was contacted about the patient ‒ had to drive to our Indianapolis clinic to retrieve the tissue for crime lab testing related to the sexual assault investigation,” Trick said in the affidavit. She adds the need to travel increasingly far distances to obtain abortion care could "hamper law enforcement’s ability to investigate and prosecute these cases in the future.” Cancer patients faced hard choices
The affidavits filed as part of the effort to stop SB 23 describe two cancer patients affected by the law.
Both illustrate doctors’ reluctance to terminate pregnancies despite the law’s exceptions for maternal health – exceptions that some doctors say are ill-defined.
In the days after SB 23 took effect, a pregnant 25-year-old went to a clinic operated by Planned Parenthood of Southwest Ohio, said Liner, the medical director there. The patient had recurrent cancer and was undergoing chemotherapy when she learned that she was pregnant.
Chemotherapy is dangerous during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy and this patient had already skipped one treatment. But when the clinic determined that she was eight weeks pregnant, workers there said they couldn’t perform an abortion, Liner said.
“Due to the patient having cancer while pregnant, we sought documentation to support a medical exception to S.B. 23 for this patient,” Liner said in her affidavit. “Her provider of care did not feel comfortable providing this and the patient had to travel out of state for an abortion to resume her cancer treatment, which caused further delay.”
Just three days after SB 23 took effect, a 37-year-old suffering from stage III melanoma went to Women’s Med Center in Dayton, Trick, the operations manager there, said. The woman was told by her doctors that she had to terminate her pregnancy before they could treat her, so she, too, would have to leave the state, Trick said.
Other illnesses
The affidavits also detail cases of fetal abnormalities and other problems so severe that pregnancies can’t result in a successful birth. One patient at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Southwest Ohio had a fetus with abnormalities including “a lack of lower extremities and the contents of the fetus’s abdomen, including possibly the heart, protruding through a defect in the abdominal wall,” Liner said in her sworn statement.
Because SB 23 doesn’t allow women in such cases to abort their pregnancies if they don’t pose an imminent threat to their health, they either have to leave the state for an abortion or carry the fetus to term ‒ even though that “can be extremely distressing for patients,” Liner said.
The Ohio Capital Journal is an independent, nonprofit news organization dedicated to connecting Ohioans to their state government and its impact on their lives. It is part of States Newsroom, a national 501(c)(3) nonprofit supported by grants and a coalition of donors and readers.
Letters: Foundation offers 'frightening snapshot' of
Ohio's possible future Letters to the Editor
Tue, September 27, 2022 Waving rainbow flags.
A 'frightening snapshot' of future
In the Sept. 15 column "It's clear Columbus parents, kids deserve more options," Jonathan Butcher and Jason Bedrick, representing The Heritage Foundation, presented a series of generalizations in an attempt to push their anti-union, anti-public education and anti-academic freedom positions.
That’s why Ohio was seventh in the nation in their school choice ranking. Our Republication legislators saw no problem in funneling public tax money into private schools.
The Heritage Foundation ranks schools just like they rank legislators depending on how closely they mirror their regressive policies. Guess which state was ranked first overall? You’re right – Florida. Think Gov. Ron Desantis banning library books.
States were also ranked on “regulatory freedom.” The examples were laughable, such as they would like to make it easier for schools to hire teachers by getting rid of red tape, even suggesting eliminating teacher certification altogether.
Would a shortage of doctors and lawyers call for eliminating medical school and law school? The only requirement that The Heritage Foundation is interested in is a willingness to abide by the party line.
These positions could be dismissed as pipe dreams if they weren’t such a frightening snapshot of where our country could be heading if we can’t do something about the minority rule that we are currently living under. Extreme viewpoints can become law in states where the majority opinion is silenced by gerrymandering.
We owe it to our children to insist on an education that prepares them to function well in a diverse society, to understand our history and to use their gifts to create a world where everyone’s dignity is respected.
Carol Rafferty, Columbus
Don't punish kids
Ohio’s Board of Education must reject the proposed wrongheaded resolution related to gender policies because of Ohio’s shared values of compassion, fairness, equality, and freedom. Student well-being requires that policies affirm students rather than punish them.
Neither do the authors understand Title IX: “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.” The purpose is to eliminate discrimination, not codify it.
This resolution does the opposite of what it purports to do.
Rather than provide support, it inflicts harm. I urge board members and all Ohio citizens to reject the resolution: "The State Board of Education stands resolutely with parents, schools, and districts in rejecting harmful, coercive, and burdensome gender identity policies, procedures, and regulations," and instead focus on school funding, support of teachers, and advances in education, not discrimination.
Besides the scientifically ignorant suggestion that all human beings have either XX or XY chromosome pairs (they don’t), Brendan Shea’s resolution, "The State Board of Education stands resolutely with parents, schools, and districts in rejecting harmful, coercive, and burdensome gender identity policies, procedures, and regulations," attempts to drag society back to a time when trans students were afraid to divulge their feelings to anyone, afraid to assert their identities, and afraid to express themselves in ways that allow for their individual happiness and personal growth.
The enforcement of what Shea’s resolution incorrectly asserts as “biological reality” has directly led to the mental anguish, social rejection, persecution and discrimination, psychological and physical harm, and in extreme cases, suicide of trans individuals.
The organization I represent, Citizens for a Better Beavercreek, condemns this mean-spirited, cruel, malicious attack on students who seek only the love, support, and acceptance that we all seek as human beings.
We encourage everyone to contact members of the Ohio State Board of Education and communicate in clear, forceful language that this is not acceptable. Take a stand to ensure LGBTQ+ students in Ohio schools feel supported, welcome, accepted – and most importantly, safe.
Jared Cutler, Beavercreek
Mexico plans $4-$5 bln LNG hub at Gulf port, president says
Tue, September 27, 2022
MEXICO CITY, Sept 27 (Reuters) - Mexico plans to build a liquefied natural gas (LNG) export hub worth between $4 billion and $5 billion in the Gulf of Mexico that will help serve European demand, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Tuesday.
The planned LNG facility in the port of Coatzacoalcos, in the eastern state of Veracruz, would transport gas by boat to Europe, Lopez Obrador said.
"We're about to promote private sector involvement, it's going to be an investment of $4-5 billion this plant," he told a regular news conference.
Lopez Obrador had previously floated the idea of an LNG plant in Coatzacoalcos, alongside other locations.
The president was speaking a week after he offered to step up cooperation with Germany over "liquid gas", according to German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier.
A Mexican official said the two had discussed LNG.
Mexico does not yet commercially export LNG, though it is one of the top crude oil exporters in the region. In August, Canadian firm TC Energy inked a deal with Mexican state power utility Comision Federal de Electricidad (CFE) to build a $4.5 billion gas pipeline connecting the port of Tuxpan with Coatzacoalcos, and the ports of Veracruz and Dos Bocas. (Reporting by Dave Graham and Raul Cortes; Writing by Kylie Madry; editing by Jonathan Oatis)
Robert Reich American political economist
Bill Clinton's Secretary of Labor blames soaring corporate profits for inflation and says the US government should consider directly controlling prices
Jacob Zinkula Wed, September 28, 2022 Former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich testifies before the Joint Economic Committee January 16, 2014 in Washington, DC.Win McNamee/Getty Images
Corporate greed, not wages, is fueling inflation, says former President Bill Clinton's Secretary of Labor.
Robert Reich says antitrust enforcement — and potentially price controls — are needed to combat inflation.
Economists disagree on whether these measures would be effective.
This includes Robert Reich, who served as Secretary of Labor for former President Bill Clinton and is currently a professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley.
"Profit-price inflation" — caused by companies "raising their prices above their increasing costs" — is the key factor fueling inflation, Reich wrote in a Guardian op-ed Sunday.
"The inflation we are now experiencing is not due to wage gains from excessive worker power," he said. "It is due to profit gains from excessive corporate power. It's profits, not wages, that need to be controlled."
As the Federal Reserve takes steps to combat inflation, there is concern among some economists that the central bank will go too far and cause unnecessary "pain" for American workers. Some have predicted that pandemic supply chain delays and excess demand for certain goods will normalize without interest rate hikes. Others have argued that prices are already slowing, or that elevated inflation is worth tolerating if it means avoiding a recession and significant job losses. Still others, like Reich, believe cracking down on record-high corporate profits is the best way to cool prices in the US.
"Congress and the administration need to take direct action against profit-price inflation, rather than rely solely on the Fed to raise interest rates and put the burden of fighting inflation on average working people who are not responsible for it," Reich wrote. Corporate power could be the reason shoppers can't catch a break
The Fed has pointed to a tight labor market as among the key drivers of rising prices in the US — as companies become more desperate to hire, they increase wages to attract talent. But Reich argues that given pay increases largely haven't kept pace with inflation, wages are actually "reducing inflationary pressures."
"This is why corporate profits are close to levels not seen in over half a century," he wrote. "Corporations have the power to raise prices without losing customers because they face so little competition."
Business profitability rose to a record-high $2 trillion in the second quarter, according to a Commerce Department report. With regards to business competition, Reich cites prior research that found at least two-thirds of US industries have become more concentrated in recent decades. He says this lack of competition has translated into rising prices for consumers in the pharmaceutical, airline, banking, broadband, automobile, and oil industries.
If antitrust enforcement is a problem worth tackling, Congress and the Biden administration — not the Fed — would be tasked with this. In recent years, antitrust cases have been filed against Facebook, Google, Apple, and Amazon for instance, and a lawsuit against American Airlines and JetBlue begins this week. Some have argued that the government should be going further to prevent monopolies.
Reich also argues a "windfall profits tax" — a temporary tax on earnings from price increases that exceed a certain level — would be effective. And if all else fails, he says price controls — or government imposed restrictions on prices — should be a "backstop."
"The current inflation, emerging from the pandemic, is analogous to the inflation after the second world war when economists advocated temporary price controls to buy time to overcome supply bottlenecks and prevent corporate profiteering," he wrote. At that time, government price controls were instituted on steel and iron for instance, to control the costs of these important defense materials.
To be sure, many economists do not believe price controls would be wise. In a January University of Chicago survey of 43 economists, only 23% said price controls could successfully reduce US inflation" over the next year, compared to the 58% who disagreed with this statement.
There is agreement, however, that the Fed's actions could cause a recession. Where disagreement remains is on whether a recession may be necessary, and if not, the best way to prevent this from happening.
ECOCIDE Nord Stream: Dramatic footage shows boiling seas as Putin accused of sabotaging pipeline
Two mysterious leaks were detected earlier this week at the Nord Stream 1 pipeline - which stopped delivering gas to Europe last month - northeast of the Danish island of Bornholm.
A third has also been detected at the newer Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which is filled with gas but was pulled from commercial operations by Germany in February days before Russia sent troops into Ukraine.
Danish authorities said the largest leak has caused a disturbance of well over 1 kilometre in diameter on the water's surface.
Analysts say such leaks are very rare and operator Nord Stream AG has described the current incident, detected on Monday, as "unprecedented".
While it could be down to technical malfunctions or a lack of maintenance, Western leaders have pointed to foul play.
Polish prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki said: "We don't know all the details of what happened, but we see clearly that it's an act of sabotage related to the next step of escalation of the situation in Ukraine."
“Based on the information we have seen so far, much indicates acts of sabotage,” said Norweigan oil and energy minister Terje Aasland.
Mykhailo Podolyak, aide to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, accused Russia of a “terrorist attack” against the EU to “destabilise the economic situation in Europe and cause pre-winter panic”.
European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen warned of the "strongest possible response" should active European energy infrastructure be attacked.
After speaking to Danish prime minister Mette Frederiksen, she said it was paramount to investigate and get full clarity on the "events and why".
The Kremlin has said it did not rule out sabotage as a reason behind the damage, adding it was an issue affecting the energy security of the "entire continent".
Kristoffer Bottzauw, head of Denmark's Energy Agency, said it could take a week for gas to stop draining out of Nord Stream 2, as ships are warned to keep a five-mile radius from the site to avoid losing buoyancy.
"The sea surface is full of methane, which means there is an increased risk of explosions in the area," he added.
Kremlin dismisses 'stupid' claims Russia attacked Nord Stream
FILE PHOTO: Pipes at the landfall facilities of the 'Nord Stream 1' gas pipline in Lubmin
Wed, September 28, 2022
MOSCOW (Reuters) -The Kremlin on Wednesday said claims that Russia was somehow behind a possible attack on the Nord Stream gas pipelines were stupid, adding that the United States had opposed the pipelines and its companies had made big profits supplying gas to Europe.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a daily conference call with reporters that the incident needed to be investigated and the timings for repair of the damaged pipelines were not clear.
Asked about claims Russia might be behind the possible attack, Peskov said: "That's quite predictable and also predictably stupid."
"This is a big problem for us because, firstly, both lines of Nord Stream 2 are filled with gas - the entire system is ready to pump gas and the gas is very expensive... Now the gas is flying off into the air."
"Are we interested in that? No, we are not, we have lost a route for gas supplies to Europe," Peskov said.
Europe has been investigating what Germany, Denmark and Sweden said were attacks which had caused major leaks into the Baltic Sea from two Russian gas pipelines at the centre of an energy standoff.
"We see the huge profits of the U.S. suppliers of liquefied natural gas, who increased their supplies many-fold to the European continent," Peskov said. "They are very, very interested in further receiving their super, super profits."
The United States plans to supply at least 15 billion cubic metres (bcm) of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to European Union markets this year as Europe seeks to wean itself off Russian gas supplies.
Russia, which slashed gas deliveries to Europe after the West imposed sanctions over Moscow's military operation in Ukraine, has said sabotage was a possibility and that the leaks undermined the continent's energy security.
"Before making any claims, we should wait for investigation into these ruptures, whether there was an explosion or not," Peskov said. Information on the incident could be expected from Denmark and Sweden, he said.
Nord Stream AG, the operator of the network, said on Tuesday that three of four offshore lines of the Nord Stream gas pipeline system sustained "unprecedented" damage in one day. All Nord Stream's pipeline had not delivered gas by the time of the incident.
Nord Stream 1 has reported a significant pressure drop caused by the gas leak on both lines of the gas pipeline, while Nord Stream 2 said that a sharp pressure drop in line A was registered on Monday.
(Reporting by Dmitry Antonov and Vladimir Soldatkin; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)
How to say stupid in Russian
What's the Russian word for stupid? Here's a list of translations.
Kremlin: sabotage cannot be ruled out as reason for Nord Stream damage
The logo of Nord Stream is seen at the headquarters of Nord Stream AG in Zug
Tue, September 27, 2022
MOSCOW (Reuters) - The Kremlin said on Tuesday that it did not rule out sabotage as a reason behind damage to the Russia-built network of Nord Stream pipelines which sprung unexplained leaks in the Baltic Sea.
The pipelines, designed to bring gas from Western Siberia's Yamal Peninsula directly to Germany, Europe's biggest economy, have been the focus of an energy war between Russia and its traditional European clients over the conflict in Ukraine.
Nord Stream AG, the operator of the network, said earlier on Tuesday that three offshore lines of the Nord Stream gas pipeline system sustained "unprecedented" damage in one day.
Asked if sabotage was the reason for the damage, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters: "No option can be ruled out right now."
The Kremlin, Peskov said, was very concerned by the situation, which required prompt investigation as it was an issue affecting the energy security of the "entire continent".
"This is a very concerning news. Indeed, we are talking about some damage of an unclear nature to the pipeline in Denmark's economic zone," Peskov said. "This is an issue related to the energy security of the entire continent."
The Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines have a joint annual capacity of 110 billion cubic metres - more than half of Russia's normal gas exports volumes.
Sweden's Maritime Authority issued a warning about two leaks in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, shortly after a leak on the nearby Nord Stream 2 pipeline was discovered that had prompted Denmark to restrict shipping in a five nautical mile radius.
Nord Stream AG said it was impossible to estimate when the gas network system's working capability would be restored.
Each line of the pipeline consists of about 100,000 24-tonne concrete-weight coated steel pipes laid on the seabed of the Baltic Sea. The pipelines have a constant internal diameter of 1.153 metres, according to Nord Stream.
Sections of the pipelines lie at a depth of around 80-110 metres.
The 1,224 km-long Nord Stream 1 consists of two parallel pipelines with nameplate annual capacity of 27.5 billion cubic metres (bcm) each, running from Vyborg, Russia to the exit point in Lubmin, Germany. It started supplying Germany in 2011.
Flows via the pipeline, which had been working at only 20% of its capacity since July, were halted at the end of August and were not restarted following maintenance.
Nord Stream 2, which runs almost in parallel to Nord Stream 1, was built in September 2021 but was never launched as Germany refused to certify it. The project was halted altogether just days before Moscow sent its troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24.
(Reporting by Reuters; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)
German officials reportedly believe the crucial Nord Stream natural-gas pipelines connecting Russia to Europe were sabotaged near a Danish island
Kate Duffy Tue, September 27, 2022 Pressure in the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines dropped sharply on Monday.Sean Gallup/Getty Images
German officials reportedly believe the Nord Stream Russia-Europe natural-gas pipelines were sabotaged.
The operator of the pipelines said Tuesday they'd suffered "unprecedented" damage in a single day.
It's not yet known who, or what, might have caused the damage.
German officials reportedly believe the crucial Nord Stream natural-gas pipelines connecting Russia to Europe have been sabotaged.
Der Tagesspiegel, a newspaper in Germany, where the pipelines land from Russia, reported a government source as saying: "We can't imagine a scenario that isn't a targeted attack. Everything speaks against a coincidence."
The Danish Navy has sent an Absalon-class frigate to site of the leaks for monitoring purposes and to warn ships to stay away, the Danish Broadcasting Corporation reported. A no-fly zone is in operation over the affected area, a German government official told Insider.
The Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipeline systems are the largest for transporting natural-gas from Russia to Europe. Each system consists of two pipelines.
Shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine, the newer Nord Stream 2 system, which at the time was filled with natural-gas but wasn't operational, was suspended. And as the war has dragged on, Russia has gradually crimped supply through Nord Stream 1, which was fully-operational before the invasion.
The Danish Energy Agency said Monday it had discovered a leak in the Nord Stream 2 system near Bornholm, a Danish island in the Baltic Sea. The Swedish Maritime Authority said leaks had been detected in both Nord Steam 1 and Nord Stream 2 near Bornholm.
On Tuesday, Nord Stream AG, the operator of the pipelines, said: "The destruction that happened within one day at three lines of the Nord Stream pipeline system is unprecedented."
Jakob Hanke Vela, a Germany-based reporter for Politico, tweeted: "Accident highly unlikely, officials in Berlin believe both pipelines have been attacked."
Die Welt, another German publication, reported that the timing of the damage suggested sabotage, and was unlikely to be an accident.
Later Tuesday, Danish prime minister Mette Frederiksen said the situation was "extraordinary" and it was "difficult to imagine" the damage was accidental.
Also later Tuesday, the Kremlin said it couldn't rule out sabotage, per Reuters.
A spokesperson for Germany's economy ministry told Insider it "doesn't participate in speculation." Germany's energy regulator, the Federal Network Agency, said in an email it was in the process of clarifying the situation.
"It seems extremely improbable that the leaks on two different pipelines happen at the same time," Mate usz Kubiak, energy analyst at the Warsaw-based Esper is consultancy, told Politico. "Therefore I think we should assume that it was intentional to create these leaks." Kubiak added that he didn't think it made sense for Ukraine or the West to sabotage the pipelines, per Politico.
Klaus Müller, president of Germany's Federal Network Agency, wrote in a Twitter post Monday the situation was "tense" but Germany and the European Union were no longer dependent on Nord Stream 1.
Since Russia halted gas supplies to Europe in early September, no gas has flowed through Nord Stream 1, the Federal Network Agency said. It added that storage levels in Germany were rising and were around 91% at the time of writing.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
SELF SABOTAGE? FALSE FLAG?
The CIA warned Germany weeks ago about a possible attack on the Nord Stream natural-gas pipelines, report says
Kate Duffy Wed, September 28, 2022 The German government, led by Chancellor Olaf Scholz, was warned by US intelligence about potential attacks on the Nord Stream pipelines, per Der Spiegel.
Danish Defence Command/Marcus Brandt/picture alliance via Getty Images
The CIA told Germany weeks ago the Nord Stream pipelines could be attacked, sources told Der Spiegel.
Three of the four pipelines are now spewing natural-gas into the Baltic Sea after suspected sabotage.
The pipelines were intended to be the main artery of natural-gas supply from Russia to Europe.
The US Central Intelligence Agency warned Germany weeks ago about potential attacks on the Nord Stream natural-gas pipelines, German magazine Der Spiegel reported Tuesday.
An anonymous source with knowledge of the matter told Der Spiegel the German government received a tip from the CIA this summer about potential attacks on the pipelines, which were intended to become the main artery for natural-gas supply from Russia to Europe. The magazine said several other unnamed individuals with knowledge of the matter had confirmed the CIA tip.
On Monday, three severe leaks were discovered on the four Nord Stream pipelines, which run from Russia to Germany through the Baltic Sea. Nord Stream AG, the operator of the pipelines, said Tuesday the damage they'd sustained was "unprecedented."
The incident has deepened Europe's energy crisis, with gas flows from Russia to Europe now all but stopped. Germany, Europe's largest economy, was the world's leading consumer of Russian natural-gas until Moscow began crimping flows to Europe in response to Ukraine war sanctions.
"As a matter of principle, we do not take a public position on matters relating to any intelligence findings or activities of the intelligence services," a spokesperson for the German government told Der Spiegel.
The CIA and the German government didn't immediately respond to Insider's requests for comment.
Images from the Swedish Coast Guard and the Danish military published Tuesday showed the effect of the leaks, with geysers of natural-gas erupting on the surface at three locations in the Baltic Sea. One of the disturbances was said to cover more than 1,000 meters.
European leaders suspect sabotage, although none have yet named a suspected perpetrator.
NATO secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg said Wednesday he'd discussed the "sabotage" of the pipelines with the Danish defence minister, and they'd "addressed the protection of critical infrastructure" in NATO countries.
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said Tuesday: "These are deliberate actions. It was not an accident." The same day, European Union President Ursula von der Leyen described the act as "sabotage" that would trigger "the strongest possible response."
German media earlier Tuesday reported government officials as saying they believed the damage to the Nord Stream pipelines wasn't accidental. The EU's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell tweeted the pipeline attacks were "not a coincidence and affect us all."
The Kremlin said Tuesday it couldn't rule out sabotage, per Reuters.
Danish Defence said an Absalon-class frigate and a pollution control ship had been sent to the area of the leaks for monitoring purposes and to warn other vessels to stay away.
