The Estonian government has refused a request by Russian-German gas company Nord Stream to carry out surveys in Estonian waters for a planned Baltic Sea gas pipeline, a senior official said.
The decision was reached after a cabinet meeting this morning, Mart Laar, head of the conservative Pro Patria-Res Publica Union, one of the Estonian coalition's three parties, told Agence France-Presse.
"Estonia had no other choice but to decline the Nord Stream request, especially taking into account the enormous environmental risks and also security risks that the construction of a Russian-German pipeline in Estonian waters will mean to us," Laar said.
Gazprom and German firms BASF and E.ON, which make up Nord Stream, agreed in 2005 to build a 1,200-kilometre (740-mile) pipeline beneath the Baltic Sea with the goal of turning on the natural gas taps by 2010 to feed more Russian supplies to the energy-hungry west European market.
The initial plan was to route the pipeline through the waters of Russia, Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Germany.
But Finland asked for the route to be shifted in order to protect the environment, and in April Nord Stream said it was considering a route off Estonia as an alternative.
(AFX News)