; Whereas the United States has important national interests in the Black Sea region, including the security of three NATO littoral states, the promotion of European energy market diversification by ensuring unfettered European access to energy exporters in the Caucuses and central Asia, and combating use of the region by smugglers as a conduit for trafficking in persons, narcotics, and arms; Whereas the Nord Stream 2 pipeline is a proposed underwater natural gas pipeline project that would provide an additional 55,000,000,000 cubic meters of pipeline capacity from the Russian Federation to the Federal Republic of Germany through the Baltic Sea; Whereas the Russian Federation’s state-owned oil and gas company, Gazprom, is the sole shareholder of the Nord Stream 2 project; Whereas, in 2017, there was spare capacity of approximately 55,000,000,000 cubic meters in the Ukrainian gas transit system; Whereas Gazprom cut off natural gas exports to Europe via Ukraine in 2006, and again in 2009, over supply and pricing disputes with Ukraine’s state-owned oil and gas company, Naftogaz; Whereas transit of Russian natural gas to Europe via Ukraine declined precipitously after the completion of Nord Stream 1 in 2011, falling from 80 percent to between 40 and 50 percent of Russia’s total exports to Europe; Whereas, in 2017, Russian gas accounted for 37 percent of Europe’s natural gas imports, an increase of 5 percent over 2016; Whereas, on December 12, 2018, the European Parliament overwhelmingly passed a resolution condemning both the Russian Federation’s aggression in the Kerch Strait and the construction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline; and Whereas, on December 11, 2018, the United States House of Representatives passed a resolution calling upon the European Union to reject the Nord Stream 2 pipeline and urging the President to use all available means to promote energy policies in Europe that reduce European reliance on Russian energy exports: Now, therefore, be it