(BERLIN) – German leader Angela Merkel issued a harsh rebuke to Washington DC over the new US Senate bill which sanctions German firms for working on the Nord Stream 2 joint venture with Russia to deliver natural gas to the continent.
“We are against extraterritorial sanctions,” Merkel said to her parliament during a Q & A yesterday about legislation passed in the U.S. Senate on Tuesday.
“And this is not a new position after yesterday’s decision, this has also been the case with sanctions on Iran, we faced the same problem,” added Merkel.
The German leader has also vowed to push back against what she believes is a the persistent campaign of US pressure.
“We haven’t backed down with regards to the NSA (spying) affair, nor do we intend to back down now,” said the Chancellor.
Sanctions would target companies currently working on the Nord Stream 2 project. The German government has criticized the Trump administration for imposing unilateral sanctions, which damage the economies of target countries as well as secondary sanctions against third-party firms and nations, all at time when Europe can ill afford to lose an economic edge.
Merkel also rejected the idea that Washington has used sanctions to enforce its own self-styled, extraterritorial global law.
Let's see. US worries Europe will become too dependent on Russia for energy. So, US imposes sanctions on European companies in order to force Europe to buy LNG from the US in order to force it to become dependent on US for energy. https://t.co/XmmqFmYO4K
— George Szamuely (@GeorgeSzamuely) December 18, 2019
Should the controversy escalate further, then it could very well morph into yet another inconvenient issue in an already tenuous NATO alliance, no unlike the recent sanctions standoff between Turkey and the United States.
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