New Russian pipeline in Baltic Sea could 'collapse' Ukraine - US State Department

A Russian proposed natural gas line through the Baltic Sea could kill Ukraine, says Amos Hochstein, Special Envoy for International Energy Affairs at the U.S. Department of State, Forbes writes.

Hochstein warned about the economic impact on Ukraine in an interview with a Slovakia news publisher called EurActiv, he retweeted his interview on his Twitter account July 29.

The 745 mile pipeline is a joint project between Gazprom and five West European partners including Shell Oil.

Hochstein said the pipeline undercuts deliveries from the southern belly of Europe, which traditionally have come into the West via Ukraine.

“Here is the level of damage you do with a project like Nord Stream 2: You take two billion dollars of revenue from shaky economy like Ukraine at a time when the international community is trying to support it. How do you recover from that? There is an easy answer. You can’t,” Hochstein said in the interview. “The economy will collapse,” Forbes quoted him as saying.