The Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, and the President of the United States, Joe Biden, held a bilateral working meeting this Saturday, taking advantage of the Group of Seven (G7) summit held in Cornwall, United Kingdom.
The spokesman for the German Government, Steffen Seibert, has confirmed the first bilateral meeting in person between Biden and Merkel through his Twitter account. Also at the table were Merkel’s foreign policy adviser, Jan Hecker, and Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan.
It should be remembered that Biden will receive Merkel on July 15 at the White House in what will be the president’s first visit to the United States since Biden came to power on January 6 of this year.
Chancellor Merkel’s visit will affirm the deep bilateral ties between the United States and Germany, and both leaders will discuss their commitment to close cooperation on a variety of common challenges, including ending the COVID-19 pandemic, the threat of climate change. , and their joint desire to promote economic prosperity and international security based on our shared democratic values, “White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement.
The current diplomatic tension between the two countries over the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline is expected to be of fundamental importance at the meeting. The structure, which will transport Russian natural gas to Germany, began its first tests on Friday, after the United States acknowledged that the project would eventually go live despite their efforts to block it.
The United States, which exports natural gas to Europe in liquefied form at prices more expensive than Russia, fears that the Kremlin could use Nord Stream 2 as a pressure measure to weaken the European Union states.
The White House is now working with Germany to limit reliance on what will be one of Russia’s largest energy supply systems from Russia to Europe, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said earlier this week, describing the completion. of the gas pipeline as a “fait accompli.”
