Germany’s government seizes Russian energy assets

and dry summer, the rain and chill in September brought some relief to parched Germans—but also a reminder of the looming winter. On September 16th Klaus Müller, boss of the Bundesnetzagentur (), Germany’s energy regulator, admitted that if it gets very cold “we will have a problem”. He could not rule out the rationing of natural gas, which Germany’s biggest supplier, Russia, has withheld as part of its war in Ukraine. Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, is doing all he can to avert this eventuality. In the past week his government has unveiled two radical measures as part of that effort. On September 21st the economy ministry announced the complete nationalisation of Uniper, Europe’s biggest and most gas-addled power utility. More controversially, five days earlier the government said it was seizing control of stakes held in three German refineries by Rosneft, Russia’s state-owned oil giant. The assets, , iand Bayernoil, were placed under the trusteeship of the .