Report: Canada, Germany mulling Nord Stream turbines

MOSCOW, Jun 23 (PRIME) -- Canada and Germany are in intensive, but private dialogue on the turbines for the Nord Stream natural gas pipeline, Russian ambassador to Canada Oleg Stepanov said in an interview to Rossiya 24 television channel broadcast on Thursday.

“We are aware that there is intensive, but not public dialogue between Berlin and Ottawa on this issue,” he said.

He also said that the Canadian authorities were considering amendments to the country’s budget that would make confiscation of the Russian assets legal.

“Even Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said that Canada would be an initiator of these legal novelties in the G7 so that they don’t simply freeze the assets, they confiscate it. And Canada is considering amendments to the budget bill now to legitimize this illegal practice,” he said, adding that around U.S. $100 of Russian assets have been frozen in Canada and $23 million more were frozen in the form of transactions.

Currently, Russian gas giant Gazprom is pumping less than half of the pipeline’s maximum capacity to Germany. The company says that problems at the Portovaya compressor station are the reason for that, and the problems were caused by the inability of Germany’s Siemens to return the station’s turbines from Canada after repairs because of the anti-Russian sanctions.

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