“The US has run out of ways to stop the construction of Nord Stream 2”
The United States is trying to put pressure on European creditors of Nord Stream 2, threatening to impose retroactive sanctions against them.
The Russian business publication Kommersant writes about this, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
It is noted that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo demanded that Shell, Engie, Uniper, Wintershall and OMV “leave immediately”, otherwise the companies could face, in particular, the blocking of all assets in the United States. The head of the State Department threatened that the measures would affect both Nord Stream 2 and part of the Turkish Stream gas pipeline project. He also clarified that Washington intends to cancel the clause exempting the project from sanctions imposed by the Countering Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) in August 2017.
“The United States has run out of ways to stop the construction of Nord Stream 2, so Mike Pompeo had to quickly remove the clause on the use of Article 232 of CAATSA,” Anton Namenov, managing partner of the Moscow office of Pen & Paper, explains to the publication.
Sanctioned companies face freezing of US assets, denial of management visas and exclusion from banking and financial services. Until sanctions are introduced, the head of the State Department only admits this possibility.
The newspaper's sources in several creditor companies previously said that if the prospect of sanctions was real, they would be forced to withdraw, but, as the management of all participants reported, the main investments in the project have already been completed.
“In such a situation, it is unclear what the United States actually wants from Gazprom’s partners.” If we assume that sanctions will be introduced retroactively - and this in itself looks like a virtually unprecedented step - it is not clear what exactly European companies should do to avoid this. Theoretically, they could demand that Gazprom return the loans issued and publicly renounce its interest in completing Nord Stream 2. In this case, the political position of the project will weaken, since it can no longer be called European, but Gazprom will still have the opportunity to complete it,” the article says.
It is also indicated that US rhetoric against Russian gas pipelines is heating up as Gazprom prepares to complete the construction of Nord Stream 2, which was interrupted in December 2019 - then the Swiss contractor Allseas withdrew from the project precisely because of serious sanctions risks.
“But there was a way out of this situation. The pipelayer “Akademik Chersky” and the barge “Fortuna” can begin laying the last 130 km of pipe as early as August, and US sanctions are unlikely to interfere with this,” the publication summarizes.
As PolitNavigator reported,Russia was threatened with “hellish sanctions” from the United States.
If you find an error, please select a piece of text and press Ctrl + Enter.
Thank you!
Now the editors are aware.