Brussels (AP) – The European Union should interrupt imports of Russian natural gas by the end of 2027 to deprive President Vladimir Putin income that helps fuel his War against UkraineBloc's executive power said on Tuesday.
In a detailed plan to present next month, The European Commission would seek to ban new gas contracts with Russia by the end of this year and to eliminate those existing still used in the EU in 27 countries by the end of 2027.
“Putin has shown that it does not care about gas armaments,” said EU energy commissioner Dan Jørgensen, highlighting the plan. “We do not want to fill his war trunk and support his war economy because who knows which countries will be the next.”
Jørgensen said that the EU had completely reduced coal purchases from Russia and considerably lowered oil and gas imports since the war against Ukraine began in 2022, but that 1.8 billion euros ($ 2 billion) in energy income still reached Moscow each month last year.
“I am a little embarrassed that last year, we have always paid 23 billion euros ($ 26 billion) to Russia while they are at war with our friends in Ukraine,” Jørgensen told journalists in Strasbourg, France.
The EU says it has reduced gas imports from 45% to 19% and oil from 27% to 3% of its pre-war levels. But that always makes it the biggest gas customer in Russia, with pipelines in the operation of the Black Sea, Belarus and Turkey, according to the Energy and Clean Air reflection group.
Ten countries continue to import energy from Russia. Those who still take its gas via pipelines include Greece, Hungary and Slovakia. Austria, Poland and the Baltic countries – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – have removed their imports.
Hungary and Slovakia – whose leaders are considered to be allies closest to Putin in Europe – have blocked EU military assistance in Ukraine and are sure to oppose the commission's gas plans.
However, EU's executive power seems determined not to allow them to oppose its veto in terms of plan and is ready to offer a system that should only be approved by two thirds of the 27 member countries, and perhaps by the European Parliament.
Jørgensen said that at the end of this year, each country would be required to subject plans showing how they intend to stop imports of Russian energy and that existing cash contracts would be prohibited, measures that would eliminate a third of imports.
He conceded that the plan would be confronted with challenges, but declared that it would be introduced “in a gradual and coordinated manner”, the support of the EU being provided if necessary for the hardest affected countries.
“Russia is a threat to all of us. Therefore, we have to act,” said Jørgensen.
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McNeil contributed to this report in Barcelona, Spain.
