Russia aims to extend its control over energy deliveries to the West and it is important that European countries push forward on efforts to diversify routes for oil and gas supplies, a senior U.S. official said on Monday.
As Vice President Dick Cheney visited Italy to seek support for Georgia after its brief war with Russia, the official, said: “The fact is Russia has worked hard to try to corner the market, so to speak, and is working to foreclose options to transit for those energy products across Russia.
“They want everything to come out through Russia and a lot of us think it’s more important that there be diverse means of gaining access to those resources,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“No one country ought to be able to totally dominate those deliveries.”
Italy was the last stop on a weeklong trip for Cheney that began with Azerbaijan, Georgia and Ukraine to reinforce U.S. support for the former Soviet states after the conflict between Tbilisi and Moscow.
The crisis erupted in early August when Georgia tried to retake the breakaway region of South Ossetia and Russia responded with overwhelming force. Cheney, in a weekend speech in Cernobbio, Italy, called Moscow’s actions “brutality against a neighbor”.
In those remarks, he also accused Russia, the world’s second largest oil producer, of using “energy as a tool of force and manipulation” in Central Asia, the Caucasus and elsewhere by threatening to interrupt the flow of oil or natural gas.
Get Out of Dodge!
Russia aims to corner energy market: U.S. official
Source: Reuters
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