Siemens Stops Turbine Sales to Russia in Sanctions Dispute
By JACK EWINGJULY 21, 2017
FRANKFURT — A dispute between Berlin and Moscow escalated on Friday after Siemens, the German industrial giant, said it would stop delivering
power plant equipment to Russia after gas turbines were moved to the disputed territory of Crimea against the company’s wishes.
Siemens said it would impose a moratorium on deliveries of power plant equipment to state-controlled firms in Russia "for the time being." A
company spokesman said he could not provide information on how many existing orders would be affected, or how many sales it stood to lose.
The company’s decision to stop deliveries of gas turbines, at least temporarily, comes less than two weeks after it complained
that a Russian customer had shipped electrical generation machinery to Crimea instead of its intended destination in southern Russia.
The Kremlin’s spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, had said
that the turbines moved to Crimea were made in Russia from Russian parts, and so were not subject to sanctions restrictions.
On Friday, the German company said four gas turbines sold to Technopromexport had been illegally moved to Crimea, twice as many as previously known.
Steffen Seibert, spokesman for the German government, said on Friday
that the transfer of the turbines was "completely unacceptable." The government is considering what action to take in reply, Mr. Seibert told reporters in Berlin.
