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EU warns Congress: Effort to handcuff Trump over Russia sanctions could backfire

Michael Birnbaum

By Michael Birnbaum The Washington Post

Published July 26, 2017

EU warns Congress: Effort to handcuff Trump over Russia sanctions could backfire

BRUSSELS - Some European leaders are warning that a Tuesday House vote to strip President Donald Trump of the ability to remove sanctions against Russia could backfire, dealing a blow to transatlantic efforts to curb Russian aggression against Ukraine.

The House of Representatives approved the measure, 419 to 3, after the Senate approved similar legislation last month in a 98-to-2 vote. The White House has not indicated whether Trump will sign the bill.

The bill's main goal is to force Trump to consult with Congress before dialing back sanctions, a reaction to a White House plan mooted in his first weeks in office to unilaterally end the measures against the Kremlin. But the legislation would also give Trump the power to ban investments in certain Russian energy projects, most notably a major Russia-to-Germany gas pipeline under development called Nord Stream 2, and to promote U.S. energy exports instead.

The bill's language was softened in the days ahead of the vote, in apparent acknowledgment of European worries. But many policymakers and experts in the EU capital, Brussels, and in Berlin still say that Congress may ultimately harm its own effort to pressure Russia. The worries are also a measure of the Trump White House's diminished standing in Europe, since the policymakers are mistrustful of U.S. natural gas exports that were welcomed during the Obama administration.

"For us, G-7 unity regarding sanctions is of key importance," said European Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas, referring to the Group of Seven major world economies. He pointed to a threat earlier this month from European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker that the EU stood ready to take up arms against any U.S. moves targeting free trade.



Juncker is set to discuss the sanctions, and Europe's response, at a Wednesday gathering of his top officials.

The initial U.S. sanctions against Russia after the 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula were unusual because they were negotiated with the European Union. Obama administration policymakers reasoned that their efforts would have a bigger effect if they presented a united front with Europe, which carries on far more trade with Russia than does the United States. Since then, policymakers on both sides of the Atlantic have moved largely in lockstep.

But Trump's unusual friendliness with Russian President Vladimir Putin has unsettled both Republicans and Democrats in Congress.

At the same time, the bill gives Trump the power to sanction the pipeline under development between Russia and Germany, which many policymakers in Europe and the United States say will harm Ukraine by enabling Russian gas to completely bypass it. The pipeline - which will double the capacity of the existing Nord Stream link - may also increase European dependence on Russian gas imports.

Days ahead of the vote, that measure was softened with language added to the bill saying that the president should coordinate with U.S. allies before moving on it, an attempt, backers said, to calm European concerns.

Many leaders in Eastern Europe are wary of the pipeline project and welcome any effort to quash it.

But even some European critics of the pipeline say that the current U.S. push is counterproductive and that Europe would be better off fighting Nord Stream internally and on its own terms.

"They are making more enemies from this anti-Nord Stream policy than they needed to," said Georg Zachmann, an energy expert at Bruegel, a Brussels-based think tank. "Essentially, if it's not managing to kill the project, it's strengthening it."

That was underlined in a joint declaration of support for the pipeline project from the German foreign minister and the Austrian chancellor last month.

Because the sanctions measure also declares support for "the export of United States energy resources in order to create American jobs," alarm bells have sounded in Europe that the bill is targeting Nord Stream simply so that U.S. industry can prosper. The Obama administration also fought the pipeline and opened U.S. natural gas for export, but it did so as part of a more cooperative approach with Europe.

"You have all of the narrative behind it, of America first," said Kirsten Westphal, an energy security expert at the Berlin-based German Institute for International and Security Affairs.

"President Trump is complaining about the high exports of Germany - if you change the terms of trade in a sense, and if you make Germany import more expensive LNG from somewhere, maybe the U.S., then this would also alter the broader balance of trade. The Europeans see the broader picture."

U.S. defenders of the effort to limit Trump's ability to roll back sanctions say Europe should calm its concerns.

"We didn't set out to fight with the European Union. We set out to counter Russia," said Daniel Fried, who directed the Obama administration's sanctions policies until January. "This bill was not directed against Europe by the Trump administration, it was directed against the Trump administration by both parties in Congress."

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