U.S. Vice President Joe Biden has said the United States believes the Nord Stream 2 natural-gas pipeline project involving Russia is a "fundamentally bad deal for Europe.”
"To lock in great reliance on Russia will fundamentally destabilize Ukraine," Biden said on August 25 during a visit to Stockholm, adding that Europe “needs diverse sources of gas."
Last year, Russia's Gazprom and its European partners agreed the project to build a second pipeline under the Baltic Sea to Germany, bypassing Ukraine.
"No country should be able to use energy as a weapon. No country should be able to use energy to coerce policies or actions from other nations," Biden said, in a veiled reference to Russia, which has on several occasions cut off gas supplies to Ukraine amid disputes.
The European Union has been seeking to reduce its dependence on Russian gas.
The bloc gets one-third of its gas from Russia and some eastern members are almost entirely reliant on Moscow for energy.