US senator calls for halting Nord Stream-2 over Navalny case

WASHINGTON/BERLIN, Sep 3 (PRIME) -- U.S. senator Tom Cotton has called on late Wednesday for halting Russia-led Nord Stream-2 gas pipeline project in response to reports about suspected poisoning of opposition leader Alexei Navalny with the Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok.

“Halt the Nord Stream-2 pipeline to hold the Russians accountable,” Cotton said on his Twitter page.

The German Green Party has also called on the federal government to shut the Nord Stream-2 pipeline after the new details in the Navalny case.

“The Nord Stream-2 is no longer a project that we can implement jointly with Russia,” the party’s leader Katrin Goering-Eckard said.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said earlier that construction of the pipeline will be completed and there are no reasons to connect the project with the Navalny case.

Jurgen Hardt, speaker for foreign affairs, said earlier on Wednesday that the parliamentary faction of Germany's Christian Democratic Union / Christian Social Union (CDU/CSU) does not rule out new sanctions against Russia over suspected poisoning of Navalny.

Maria Zakharova, spokeswoman for Russia’s Foreign Ministry, said later that the German Foreign Office did not bring up sanctions with Russian Ambassador Sergei Nechayev, who was summoned on Wednesday for a briefing on the new findings in the Navalny case.

“No, the ambassador was told nothing of the kind, nothing at all,” Zakharova told Rossiya 24 television channel.

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