The Bundestag has voted nearly unanimously in favour of completing the Nord Stream 2 Baltic pipeline that has been souring the relationship between the European Union and the US.
Nord Stream 2
546 voted in favour of completing the pipeline compared to the 86 delegates, mainly from the Green Party, who voted against it, according to chairwoman of the meeting Claudia Roth.
The project has less than 100km of pipeline remaining but has been on indefinite hiatus for almost a year owing to US intervention in its construction.
US officials fear the pipeline will make the EU too reliant on Russia - an unreliable foreign neighbour - for its energy needs.
The Trump administration first imposed sanctions on businesses aiding in the construction of the pipeline back in December of 2019. Sanctions were ramped up significantly in July causing some lead players, including a tanker equipped to lay the pipes, to pull out.
A recent independent Bundestag report found the US did not break international law with these sanctions, despite objections from the European Commission.
The US is expected to pass new sanctions on the pipeline by the end of the year. The House of Representatives and the Senate yesterday formed a committee, who came to an agreement that further action needs to be taken.
The key issue to be reconciled by the committee is a provision in the Senate version that would impose sanctions against anything or anyone that "provided services for the testing, inspection or certification necessary for, or associated with, the operation of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline," the report states.
It is likely this legislation will come ahead of President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration on January 20, although some lawmakers are suggesting a compromise with German officials owing to their vast opposition to the sanctions.
German foreign ministry deputy for economic affairs Alexander Schonfelder said in a statement: "Coordination has to be more than just giving a heads up five minutes before sanction policies take place. Needless to say, sanctions against allies are not acceptable."
Mark Hauptmann, a representative from the Bundestag's centre-right CDU/CSU division, admitted German officials expect Biden to continue Trump's sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 project.
He added: “We've seen that President-elect Joe Biden does not deviate from the positions of the Trump administration. On the contrary, he is ready to impose even tougher sanctions on insurance companies and certification agencies.
"It must be clearly stated that we, both on the part of the government and as a faction of the alliance, reject extraterritorial sanctions."
Earlier in the assembly, Klaus Ernst, the head of the Bundestag Committee Economics and Energy, compared the actions of the US government to the mafia.
He said: "With the arrival of the new President, the US' policy is unlikely to change."
The Biden administration has also promised further sanctions on Russia owing to alleged interference in the US election.
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