The European Union risks a confrontation with Donald Trump after attempting to delay the awarding of a lucrative contract for a Balkan pipeline to a company represented by his personal lawyer, according to documents seen by The Guardian.
Brussels has already clashed with Trump over trade, Ukraine, and military spending, but the intervention in the “Southern Interconnection” pipeline project appears to represent the first time the EU has challenged a commercial venture of those close to the American president, the British newspaper assesses.
The pipeline will pass through Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the contract was awarded to a company based in Wyoming.
The company AAFS Infrastructure and Energy was founded in November last year and has not disclosed its owners. It is represented by two leading members of Trump’s campaign to overturn his 2020 election loss: Jesse Binnall, a lawyer who defended him against charges of inciting the Capitol riots after his defeat, and Joe Flynn, the brother of the US president’s former national security advisor.
AAFS plans to invest 1.5 billion dollars in the pipeline and other infrastructure projects in Bosnia, its local representative stated.
Warning from the European Union
The Brussels representative in Sarajevo issued a private warning to Bosnia’s leaders that they are jeopardizing the country’s hopes for entering the European Union.
In a letter sent on April 13, obtained by the Bosnian investigative portal istraga.ba and seen by The Guardian, EU official Luigi Soreca wrote that, according to the energy agreement between Bosnia and Brussels, it is “crucial that draft laws be thoroughly coordinated” with the EU.
Soreca stated that Brussels should have a say in the pipeline legislation. “In this way, Bosnia and Herzegovina can continue to progress on its European path and avoid missing opportunities for further integration, as well as financial opportunities,” he said.
Pipeline a priority for the Trump administration
Binnall, however, stated that the pipeline is a “priority for the Trump administration.”
Asked about the EU intervention, he said that “AAFS will never lose sight of what is truly important in this project: ensuring energy security and encouraging economic development for the citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina.”
“We are committed to close cooperation with all relevant authorities on the development of the infrastructure needed to make this vision a reality,” stated one of the two known representatives of the company.
Geopolitical significance of the pipeline
By connecting Bosnia with the liquefied natural gas terminal on the Croatian coast, the pipeline would allow American gas to reach a country that depends entirely on Russia for its supply.
After Russia attacked Ukraine in 2022, Brussels set a deadline for EU members, as well as for countries aspiring to membership, like Bosnia, to stop buying Russian gas by 2028.
Still, Brussels faces the possibility that a “key new figure on the European energy chessboard falls under the control of not just an American company, but a company personally linked to an antagonistically minded president.”
The AAFS company website features a large eagle, evoking American power.
The site does not list any employees, but it states they have “decades of combined experience in the fields of energy, infrastructure, finance, and international project development.” It does not appear that AAFS has ever undertaken any infrastructure projects on the scale of the one planned in the Balkans, The Guardian states.
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Source: ST / Nedeljnik; Photo: US Embassy Sarajevo