Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky | File pic
Russia’s state-owned energy giant Gazprom said on Wednesday (January 1, 2025) that it was stopping natural gas supply to Europe through Ukraine as Kyiv had refused to renew gas transit deal with it. The previous five-year deal expired on Wednesday. It is expected that stoppage of gas supply will not only make Ukraine lose millions of dollars worth of transit fees but it will also deprive Russia of billions of dollars of revenue.
“Due to the repeated and clearly expressed refusal of the Ukrainian side to renew these agreements, Gazprom was deprived of the technical and legal ability to supply gas for transit through the territory of Ukraine from January 1, 2025,” said Gazprom in a statement through its Telegram channel.
Ukraine on the other hand, sounded triumphant
“We stopped the transit of Russian gas. This is a historic event. Russia is losing its markets, it will suffer financial losses. Europe has already made the decision to abandon Russian gas,” said German Galushchenko, Ukraine’s Energy Minister in a statement.
As per Gazprom, the gas supply to Europe stopped from 5 am GMT on January 1.
Russia is a major exporter of energy products. Its supply of oil and natural gas, or the continuance of it has been a major issue of concern for Europe evet since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Russia has also leveraged its position of energy supplier to Europe to put pressure on it as major European countries supported Ukraine.
Since then, European countries have sought to diversify its energy imports to reduce its dependence on Russia. This has forced Russia to find new takers for its energy products, like China and India.
The European Union however sounded unfazed over Wednesday’s stoppage of natural gas supply.
“The Commission has been working for more than a year specifically on preparing for a scenario without Russian gas transiting via Ukraine,” news agency AFP quoted a senior official as saying.
