Interior secretary: US wants to strengthen energy ties with Greece

U.S. officials say that the United States is looking to strengthen its energy relations with Greece. While visiting Athens, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum stated that the Trump administration is working to further reduce Russia’s oil and natural gas supplies into Europe. Burgum was in Europe to sign energy deals that the U.S. hopes can strengthen their influence in the area while weakening Russia’s.

Greece announced on Wednesday that a consortium, including the oil giant Chevron, had bid for exploration of natural gas in their waters.

Burgum said to Prime Minister Kyriakos Mistitakis in Athens that the Trump administration had a few goals regarding energy. One of them is to provide energy to our allies and friends so they don't have to purchase from our enemies.

The EU has reduced its Russian oil imports 90% due to a ban on the seaborne shipment of crude oil, but Hungary & Slovakia continue to import through pipelines. EU data indicates that Europe will purchase 13% of their gas from Russia in this year. This is down from the 45% it purchased before Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

The U.S. pressed the EU to speed up the phase-out of Russian fossil fuels in order to reduce the funds available to Moscow. As part of this push, the U.S. is offering more of its abundant shale oil and gas reserves as export deals.

In the first six months of 2018, Greece's imports from the United States of liquefied gas have increased by 95%.

The controversial maritime agreement signed in 2019 has caused tensions between Greece and Turkey. Chevron's interest in some blocks offshore Crete is near the disputed area.

The Greek government has interpreted this as tacit support from the United States for its maritime borders.

Mitsotakis said to Burgum that it was an interesting coincidence that Mitsotakis came a day after Chevron submitted a formal interest in starting exploratory work south of Crete. This confirmed the sovereignty rights of the Hellenic Republic of Greece in this area.

(source: Reuters)