Friday, May 6, 2022

Trump, Biden, Pipelines

Someone challenged me concerning the relationship of Trump and Biden to the Russian natural gas pipelines.

12/21/19 BBC:

President Donald Trump has signed a law that will impose sanctions on any firm that helps Russia's state-owned gas company, Gazprom, finish a pipeline into the European Union.

The sanctions target firms building Nord Stream 2, an undersea pipeline that will allow Russia to increase gas exports to Germany.

The US considers the project a security risk to Europe.

Both Russia and the EU have strongly condemned the US sanctions.

5/20/21 BBC:

The Biden administration has waived sanctions on a company building a controversial gas pipeline between Russia and Germany.

The US also lifted sanctions on the executive - an ally of Russia's Vladimir Putin - who leads the firm behind the Nord Stream 2 project.

The move came in a report on Russian sanctions delivered to Congress by the Department of State.

Critics say the pipeline is a major geopolitical prize for the Kremlin.

The project, which would take gas from the Russian Arctic under the Baltic Sea to Germany, is already more than 95% complete.

The Department of State report notes that Nord Stream 2 AG and its chief executive, Matthias Warnig, a former East German intelligence officer, engaged in sanctionable activity.

But it concludes that it is in the US national interest to waive the sanctions. 

Israel has been trying to run  a natural gas pipeline to Greece to provide a non-Russian source.  1/18/22 Jerusalem Post:

The US no longer supports the proposed EastMed natural-gas pipeline from Israel to Europe, the Biden administration has informed Israel, Greece and Cyprus in recent weeks.

State Department officials conveyed the new position to the Foreign Ministry, a diplomatic source in Jerusalem confirmed Tuesday. The Foreign Ministry declined to comment on the matter.

The reversal of position from that of the Trump administration was first reported in Greece earlier this month.

Former US secretary of state Mike Pompeo and former energy secretary Dan Brouillette expressed US support for the pipeline when they were in office.

But Washington informed Athens it was reversing course from the Trump administration in a “non-paper,” a diplomatic term for an unofficial, or off-the-record, communication this month. 

But no mean tweets! 

1 comment:

  1. reading those headlines in date order, who, exactly IS Putin's little bitch? If you will pardon my crudity, even though compared to leftist crudity it is as one is to one hundred.

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