“US imposes new sanctions to kill off Putin’s pet pipeline,”

“US imposes new sanctions to kill off Putin’s pet pipeline,” headlines an Atlantic Council piece by Diane Francis, posted Saturday. “It means almost certain doom for Putin’s most important energy project and prevents Russia from tightening its control over EU natural gas supplies,” she writes of the sanctions which severely penalize companies constructing, insuring and certifying Nord Stream 2. Warning of the pipeline’s geopolitical significance, she adds that the gas line “would also damage Ukraine by rendering the country’s gas transportation system largely redundant and depriving Kyiv of significant transit revenues.” Francis quotes Senator Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, predicting last month: “This project will never deliver gas.”