After a long lead time, the investigative committee for the controversial climate foundation MV now has the first files. But the opposition complains that these are only delivered in portions and are difficult to evaluate. It’s not the only complaint.
Schwerin (dpa/mv) – The opposition in the Schwerin state parliament accuses the governing parties SPD and Linke of obstructing the clarification of the processes surrounding the controversial climate protection foundation MV. Data would only be presented to the parliamentary committee of inquiry set up for this purpose with a delay and not in a systematic way. “Around 2,800 individual files are now to be made available bit by bit. But even the first glance has revealed that the metadata cannot be searched systematically,” complained Green MP Hannes Damm after a committee meeting on Friday. In addition, many documents come only in paper form.
A stipulation for witness interviews, which was enforced by the SPD and the left, provided further explosive material, according to which these can be stopped at any time out of consideration for the respondents. “The justification presented by the SPD that witnesses could get into an emotional state of emergency during the questioning is far-fetched. The fact that a questioning can sometimes get heated is the point of such a questioning – otherwise the committee could do that Summoning witnesses,” explained CDU MP Sebastian Ehlers.
He criticized Red-Red’s rejection of the proposal to stop surveys only for important reasons and with the consent of all committee members. “We will discuss internally how to deal with the renewed curtailment of parliamentary minority rights,” announced Ehlers.
The SPD MP Philipp da Cunha rejected the criticism. The opposition had questioned a formulation for the end of the witness interviews, which had already been used word for word by other investigative committees of the state parliament. But procedural issues are always majority decisions. “We formally reject the attempt by the opposition to derive a scandal and an undemocratic understanding from this,” said da Cunha. The coalition factions neither intended to prematurely end critical witness interviews, nor did they want to make the investigation more difficult.
The special committee was formed on June 17 at the initiative of the CDU, Greens and FDP to clarify the circumstances of the founding of the foundation. The foundation was set up by the state in early 2021 to promote climate protection and at the same time to actively support the completion of the Russian-German Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline. The main financier of the foundation was the Gazprom subsidiary Nord Stream 2 AG with 20 million euros, the state provided 200,000 euros as a contribution.
Critics speak of a sham foundation in which climate protection was only intended to cover up the actual purpose of completing the gas pipeline while circumventing the threat of US sanctions. The line was finally completed in 2021, but did not receive an operating license from the German authorities because of the Russian actions against Ukraine.
Prime Minister Manuela Schwesig (SPD) has been criticized for months for her commitment to pipeline construction and the foundation. The state government has already publicly acknowledged that representatives of Nord Stream 2 had an influence on the wording of the foundation’s charter. It was also announced that the foundation initiated orders and deliveries worth 165 million euros for the pipeline construction. “The fear of what the committee of inquiry could possibly bring to light must be really great,” said Ehlers, referring to the SPD’s actions in the committee.
For his part, Da Cunha recalled that the state parliament supported the construction of the Baltic Sea pipeline across all factions and commissioned the state government unanimously at the beginning of 2021 to found the climate foundation. “The state government had fulfilled exactly this task accordingly,” said the SPD politician. In the past legislative period, the SPD and CDU formed the government.
