European Commission has been working on a single position and has been preparing an official reaction to the letter of Central and Eastern European countries about the request to suspend draft construction of the North Stream-2 gas pipeline initiated by Russia in autumn, Marosh Shefchovich, EC Vice President, said in his interview to EurActiv.
At the initiative of Poland and Slovakia nine countries have sent a joint letter addressed to the European Council President Donald Tusk announcing their intention to block North Stream-2, which undermines safety of the European Union, reported Financial Times newspaper.
Shefchovich said that the gas pipeline construction issue is very sensitive from political viewpoint.
“We will be working on the response to the letter together with the European Commissar for Climate and Energy Miguel Arias Canette. We will find opinion of others and other European Commissars. This is an official letter and we must present our official position,” Shefchovich said.
He added that the main issue is if the project will observe the EU legislation and if Russian gas transit to Europe via Ukraine will be preserved.
North Stream-2 envisages construction of two gas pipeline branches with a total capacity of 55 billion cub.m. of gas a year from the Russian coast to Germany via the Baltic Sea. In September 2015 Gasprom company signed a contract with the shareholders of a joint company, which will create North Stream-2. The shareholders included Gasprom, E.On, Shell, OMV, BASF/Wintershall and Engie (former GdFSuez).
