Oliver Hermes, president of the Ost-Ausschuss, the German Eastern Business Association, national organization of German industries with business in Russia and Eastern Europe, has denounced the threat of sanctions against the Baltic port Sassnitz/Mukran in a letter by three neo-con U.S. Senators as “unprecedented.” In no way, he said, “is it acceptable that American Congress members threaten a German infrastructure company, in which the public sector has shares, with economic and financial ruin, just because it does not back down to U.S. demands. This is blackmail.“ The threatening letter had arrived at the office of the port management on Aug. 5.