Berlin accused Washington of interfering in its internal affairs yesterday, after Donald Trump signed off on US sanctions against companies building a Russian gas pipeline to Germany.

“The Federal Government rejects such extraterritorial sanctions,” Ulrike Demmer, a spokesman, said in Berlin. “They affect German and European companies and constitute an interference in our domestic affairs.”

The US is an outspoken opponent of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which will transport natural gas about 1,200km from Russia, through the Baltic Sea and into Germany.

The sanctions will hit any company working with the Russian state-owned firm Gazprom to complete the project.

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Yesterday, Switzerland- based Allseas, which operates ships laying sections of the undersea pipeline, said it was suspending work on the €10bn project, which is well advanced.

Washington and Eastern European countries oppose the project because it will increase the EU’s heavy dependence on Russian gas imports, doubling Russian energy imports to Germany and, the US fears, giving the Kremlin leverage over the EU and its economy.

The project bypasses Ukraine, raising fears it would cost the country valuable gas transit fees it receives from Moscow. Ms Demmer said the US measures were “particularly incomprehensible” because Russia and Ukraine reached an agreement in principle last Thursday on the future transit of Russian gas through Ukrainian territory.

The German-Russian Chamber of Commerce insisted last week that the pipeline was important for energy security and urged retaliatory sanctions against the US if the bill passes.

Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, has already admitted that she sees little point in retaliation against the US move.

She said last Wednesday: “I see no alternative to conducting talks, though very firm talks, to show that we do not approve of this practice.”

The European Commission said it would carefully examine the sanctions to see how they affected EU firms.

Both houses of Congress overwhelmingly approved the sanctions, with the Senate voting last Tuesday to send the measure to Trump’s desk.

©Telegraph

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