Russia has suspended deliveries of Kazakh crude oil to eastern Germany through the much-contested northern Druzhba pipeline, raising renewed concerns over the region’s energy security.
Germany has downplayed the immediate risk of a nationwide fuel crisis, insisting that alternative supply routes remain available.
However: the disruption places fresh pressure on the PCK Schwedt refinery, one of the country’s most strategically important energy facilities.
Schwedt, located near the Polish border, supplies most of the fuel consumed in Berlin and large parts of eastern Germany.
The interrupted deliveries involved Kazakh oil transported via Russian infrastructure.
Moscow confirmed that the crude originally destined for Germany would be redirected elsewhere, citing unspecified “technical possibilities.” Kazakhstan, meanwhile, linked the disruption to recent attacks on Russian infrastructure.
The affected route accounted for roughly 17% of Schwedt’s crude supply. Germany imported more than 2.1 million tonnes of Kazakh oil through the Druzhba network in 2025, alongside another 730,000 tonnes during the first quarter of 2026.
German authorities say alternative deliveries via the ports of Rostock and Gdańsk should help stabilize supplies. Poland’s pipeline operator PERN has also indicated its willingness to transport crude to Schwedt on behalf of the refinery’s non-Russian stakeholders.
This comes as regional elections are scheduled for September in Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, two eastern states where the AfD currently holds strong polling positions. The party has repeatedly called for Germany to restore Russian oil and gas imports, arguing that sanctions and energy decoupling have harmed German consumers and industry.
The situation also highlights Germany’s lingering entanglement with Russian energy assets: Russian state oil giant Rosneft still formally owns a 54.17% stake in the Schwedt refinery, although the German government placed the company’s local operations under trusteeship after the invasion of Ukraine.
In any case, backup systems are less efficient and have more limited capacity than the original Soviet-era pipeline infrastructure Schwedt was built around.
