WEST BANK (Dispatches) – The United States has abandoned a subsea pipeline designed to supply Europe with natural gas from the Eastern Mediterranean and the Israeli-occupied territories, as tensions continue to grow in the region.
In an unofficial document issued by the U.S. government, revealed by Greek media outlets, Washington expressed its concerns that the project would be a “primary source of tension” and would have a “destabilizing” effect.
The plans – known as the EastMed pipeline project – were agreed upon by the Zionist regime, Greece and Cyprus at the beginning of 2020, and aimed to build a pipeline harnessing the reserves of natural gas off the southern shores of Cyprus, which would supply gas from the eastern Mediterranean region to countries in Europe.
The former U.S. administration of President Donald Trump also lent support to those plans, but Turkey condemned the agreement as an attempt to diplomatically and economically push Ankara out of the region and infringe on its energy and maritime rights. It led to Turkey’s regional dispute with Greece and Egypt, in particular, significantly exacerbating existing tensions at the time.
According to the Greek state-owned broadcaster ERT, the U.S.’s non-paper listed the three reasons the government no longer supports the EastMed project as being environmental concerns, the lack of economic and commercial viability and the creation of tensions in the region.
Following the reports about the non-paper, the U.S. Embassy in Athens issued a statement assuring that it still remains “committed to physically interconnecting East Med energy to Europe”, but that it supports “projects such as the planned EuroAfrica interconnector from Egypt to Crete and the Greek mainland, and the proposed EuroAsia interconnector to link the Israeli, Cypriot and European electricity grids”.
The reason the Trump administration supported the project was reportedly due to the need for Europe to diversify its energy supply away from Russia and towards others, such as the occupying regime. According to the embassy statement, however, the current administration of President Joe Biden is changing that policy by shifting its focus on supporting both gas and renewable energy sources through electricity interconnectors.
The occupying regime of Israel also reportedly harbored doubts about the viability of the EastMed project, as the cost will be over $7 billion, while Tel Aviv and Europe are instead planning to develop and depend on renewable energies in the future.
According to the London-based news outlet Middle East Eye, an anonymous Turkish official told it that Turkey was not surprised by the decision, saying “U.S. officials never thought this project was feasible” and admitting that “We knew that they didn’t support it.”