German populist politician Sahra Wagenknecht is campaigning to resume imports of Russian oil to the PCK refinery in the eastern German city of Schwedt.
Wagenknecht, who founded the Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) earlier this year, said she would implement the policy change if the party did well in upcoming elections on September 22 in the eastern state of Brandenburg, which includes Schwedt.
Germany cut off Russian oil imports after a massive invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and seized control of the refinery, which is mostly owned by a subsidiary of Russia’s state oil company Rosneft. That has cast doubt on the refinery’s future.
In the first half of 2024, the plant’s capacity utilization was 76.2%, the German government recently announced in response to a parliamentary inquiry. Capacity utilization was 98.8% in 2021, before the invasion of Ukraine.
Wagenknecht told dpa on Saturday that buying Russian crude would be better than “the laborious and expensive begging for oil without ultimately being able to achieve full capacity utilization” of the refinery.
Wagenknecht’s political party, which combines some traditionally left-wing social policies with right-wing positions on issues such as immigration, opposes German aid to Ukraine and takes a conciliatory stance towards the Russian regime under Vladimir Putin.
If BSW succeeds in becoming part of the government in Brandenburg, Wagenknecht said they would not accept the German embargo on Russian oil, but would actively pressure Berlin to reverse the policy.
She called compliance with the oil embargo against Russia a “stupid policy at the expense of Brandenburg and the entire country”, which not only puts jobs at the Schwedt refinery at risk, but also makes energy unnecessarily expensive for everyone in Germany.
