MOSCOW, December 22. /TASS/. The European side sees its commercial advantages from the construction of the Nord Stream-2 gas pipeline, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Sunday.
"It [Nord Stream-2] is being threatened [by the United States]. I said it will be built in any event, despite all these threats. First, I am convinced that the Europeans see their commercial advantages. Second, it is of interest from the point of view of long-term energy security. Third, they [the European] have been humiliated, after all. The words came from Berlin among others, which demonstrates that our European partners till have self-respect," he said in an interview with the Bolshaya Igra (Big Game) program on Russia’s television Channel One.
"I am sure Nord Stream-2, like Turk Stream, will finally been implemented. Turk Stream will be launches just in a couple of weeks", he added.
According to the Russian top diplomat, the United States Congress is "bombing" bilateral relations with sanctions in a bid not to let President Donald Trump and State Secretary Michael Pompeo develop trade with Russia. "In their zeal to revise the election results and the expression of the will of the American people, these congressmen will stop at nothing, including absolutely reckless things that, I would say, are unworthy of serious politicians," he stressed.
Nord Stream-2 is an international project for the construction of a gas pipeline that will run across the bottom of the Baltic Sea from the Russian coast to Germany bypassing transit states, such as Ukraine, Belarus, Poland and other Eastern European and Baltic countries.
The new 1,200 kilometer pipeline, basically following the same route as Nord Stream, will traverse economic zones and territorial water of five countries, namely Russia, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, and Germany. The pipeline’s capacity will be 55 billion cubic meters of gas a year. By now, only Denmark has not yet issued a permit for the pipeline construction.