By Daria Sito-Sucic
SARAJEVO, April 27 (Reuters) – Environmental activists in the Western Balkans on Monday urged their governments to resist lobbying from the United States to build gas infrastructure in the region, and focus on renewable energy, in line with EU policy.
As the European Union plans to ban all Russian gas imports by 2028, the U.S. wants to pump its excess gas and oil into the Western Balkans and cut the region’s dependence on Russian gas and oil. Activists say new gas projects would have a negative impact on climate and on the economy, arguing long-term investments will not pay off.
Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) and Croatia are due to sign an inter-governmental agreement at the Three Sea Initiative summit in Dubrovnik later this week on transporting U.S. natural gas to Bosnia from a liquefied natural gas terminal on the Croatian island of Krk.
The agreement will authorise U.S. company AAFS Infrastructure and Energy LLC to build the Southern Interconnection gas pipeline and run it under a concession agreement.
“Permitting, expropriation and construction could easily take a decade and the infrastructure alone would cost billions, even before the costs of gas are included,” activists from 47 non-governmental organisations said in a joint statement.
They appealed to the governments of Albania, Bosnia, Serbia, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Kosovo to autonomously decide on their energy plans, in line with EU legislation and policy and based on updated and publicly available evidence and public consultations.
AAFS Infrastructure and Energy LLC, formed last year in the United States and run by Jesse Binnall, a former Trump lawyer, and Joseph Flynn, the brother of Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn, has said it would invest about 1.5 billion euros ($1.76 billion) in the project.
Earlier this month, Bosnia’s regional parliament amended the law regulating the gas pipeline project to name AAFS as its key investor and leader.
The EU delegation in Bosnia last week warned the country, which aspires to join the bloc, that it needs to align its legislation and standards with those of the EU, including on energy policy.
“Bosnia and Herzegovina has enormous renewable energy potential, and the focus of EU energy policy in BiH is to support the country to realise this potential,” the EU delegation said in a statement to Reuters.
($1 = 0.8517 euros)
(Reporting by Daria Sito-Sucic; Editing by Susan Fenton)
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