Biden called “Nord Stream-2″ a bad deal for Europe – RBC

The US Vice-President Joe Biden

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pipeline” Nord stream-2 “project is unprofitable for Europe, said US Vice President Joe Biden

Come on Thursday in Stockholm for a meeting with Swedish Prime Minister Stephen Leuven US vice president called the “Gazprom” agreement with energy companies of the European Union (BASF / Wintershall, ENGIE, Uniper, OMV, Shell) «bad deal” for Europe as a whole, according to Reuters .

«no country should not use energy as a weapon. “Nord Stream-2″ – is a bad deal for Europe “, – he said at a press conference (quoted by TASS). Biden said, Europe needs to diversify its energy market. In addition, in his opinion, the project “could destabilize Ukraine».

Earlier, against the construction of the gas pipeline, which will increase the opportunities to export gas to Europe, bypassing Ukraine, he was made Secretary of State John Kerry. In May 2016, Secretary of State expressed “absolute confidence” that the project “North Stream-2″ will have a negative impact on the Ukraine, Slovakia and Eastern Europe.

At the beginning of August 2016, a special envoy of the US State Department on world energy Amos Hochstein said that the commissioning of the second stage of the “Nord stream-2″ will deprive Ukraine $ 2 billion in revenue from fees for the transit of Russian gas to Europe, which could “cause the Ukrainian economy to collapse»

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The $ 2 billion a year estimated the loss of Ukraine from the start “Nord stream-2″ and Arseniy Yatsenyuk, then-prime minister of this country. “This project should be blocked because it does not meet the interests of neither the EU nor Ukraine”, – said Ukrainian Prime Minister in December 2015. The danger of “Nord Stream” said Polish President Andrzej Duda, according to which the pipeline is not only an effort on energy security of Poland and Ukraine, but also poses a threat to European unity.

In July 2016 antitrust regulator UOKiK Poland He refused to agree on the construction of “Nord stream-2″, explaining his decision by saying that the proposed transaction could lead to a “substantial restriction of competition.” Later, “Gazprom” and its five European partners (Shell, OMV, ENGIE, Uniper and Wintershall) withdrew an application for a joint venture on the “Nord Stream-2».