German chemicals maker BASF SE’s decision to call off a long-planned asset-swap deal with Russia’s OAO Gazprom wasn’t the result of political pressure from the German government, the German Economics Ministry said Friday. BASF, the world’s largest chemical company by revenue, announced Thursday it had canceled the deal with Russian state gas group Gazprom amid mounting political tensions between Russia and the West. BASF, through its wholly-owned oil and gas unit, Wintershall AG, had planned to divest itself of its gas trading and storage operations through an asset exchange with Gazprom. The trade, announced in November 2012, would have given Wintershall access to natural-gas fields in Siberia. “This is a corporate process. From the German side, there was no political influence over the deal,” said Julia Modes, a spokesperson for the ministry. “For us, it is only important that the gas supply or the security of supply is not […]