US issues Nord Stream 2-related sanctions on Russians

US President Joe Biden’s administration sanctioned a Russian insurer named in the New Nord Stream 2 report presented to the US Congress on Friday.

The Biden administration imposed sanctions on two Russian entities over their involvement in the Nord Stream 2 pipeline project, but is leaving in place a waiver that spared the company overseeing the construction and its top executive. The U.S. listed St. Petersburg, Russia-based Nobility, and a Russian insurer, Constanta, that was established after other insurers backed out of the project under threat of sanctions, according to three people familiar with the report that went to Congress on Friday. They asked not to be identified because specifics of the report aren’t public. The designations, which also include a supply ship, the Ostap Sheremeta, mean the Biden administration has now identified 23 entities or people for sanctions over the pipeline, which will run from Russia to Germany and which the U.S. says would give Moscow a strangle-hold on Europe’s energy security.