Germany (Washington Insider Magazine) -Outgoing German Chancellor Angela Merkel in an Aug. 22 meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy attempted to alleviate Kyiv’s fears of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which is set to carry Russian gas via under the Baltic Sea to Europe. This pipeline would bypass Ukraine in the process, the traditional gas supply route through Europe.
During the post-meeting news conference in the Ukrainian capital in Kyiv, Zelenskyy warned Merkel that the pipeline would be used by Russia as a “political weapon.“
“We view this project exclusively through the prism of security and consider it a dangerous geopolitical weapon of the Kremlin,” he said as reported by France24.
After forcibly seizing Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in early 2014, Russian-armed formations have waged a war in eastern Ukraine in Europe’s only ongoing shooting conflict, killing about 14,000 people and internally displacing an additional 1.5 million people.
Officials in Kyiv fear once the Russian pipeline project is completed, Ukraine would be left exposed to further Russian aggression.
Ukraine benefits from an existing natural-gas transit deal worth an estimated $7 billion dollars that will expire in 2024.
Germany and the United States have vowed to work with Ukraine and Russia in negotiating an extension beyond the 2024 deadline following the U.S.-German agreement to lift U.S. sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline in July.
Russia currently supplies more than 40% of gas bound to EU markets, and the Nord Stream 2 pipeline would increase the amount of gas flow under the Baltic Sea to 110 billion cubic meters per year.
Merkel reassured doubters that the pipeline would not be used as a Russian geopolitical weapon and promised to lead the EU in imposing sanctions on Moscow should any adverse action be taken against Ukraine.
She told reporters during the news conference that “we made clear that we will take action in a European framework toward further sanctions if the suspicion gains traction that the pipeline is being used as a weapon,” Bloomberg reported.
Other discussion points included Merkel’s request to move forward peace talks in eastern Ukraine. Zelenskyy echoed Merkel’s call for a joint Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France leaders meeting on ending the war in eastern Ukraine, Euronews reported.
The meeting in Kyiv comes as Merkel, who will step down as chancellor in September following national elections, was in Moscow on Aug. 20 for a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Putin noted that the Nord Stream 2 pipeline has roughly 15 kilometers (9 miles) before it is completed, AP reported.
Merkel and Putin also verbally clashed on the issue of imprisoned Russian dissident Alexei Navalny.
Germany treated the Russian blogger after he was poisoned on Aug. 20, 2020, on a plane in Russia, with analysts blaming the Russian government, RFE/RL reported. The leaders also discussed the return of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan, the Iranian nuclear deal, and the stalled talks for peace in eastern Ukraine, German broadcaster Deutsche Welle reported.
