Eastern Europe Bashes West as Putin Gas Link Plan Splits EU

The prime ministers of Slovakia and Ukraine criticized an agreement between western European companies from Germany‘s EON AG to Paris-based Engie with Russian pipeline gas export monopoly Gazprom PJSC to expand a Baltic Sea link. Western European leaders and companies are „betraying“ their eastern neighbors, Slovakia‘s Robert Fico said after meeting Ukraine‘s Arseniy Yatsenyuk in the Slovak capital of Bratislava on Thursday.

Gazprom and EON, Engie, Royal Dutch Shell Plc, OMV AG and BASF SE signed an agreement last week to expand Nord Stream by 55 billion cubic meters a year, which would double its capacity to almost 30 percent of current EU demand. Ukraine, already struggling to avoid a default amid a conflict with Moscow-backed separatists in its east, is set to lose $2 billion a year in transit fees while Slovakia would lose hundreds of millions of euros, the leaders said.