
Much to the surprise of the western world, Russia's Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novakis has hinted at resuming gas supplies to Europe via the Yamal-Europe pipeline.
"The European market remains relevant, as the gas shortage persists, and we have every opportunity to resume supplies. For example, the Yamal-Europe Pipeline, which was stopped for political reasons, remains unused," Novakis told the Russian news agency TASS.
Novakis also said the gas supplies to Europe had increased despite the disruptions.
"Even now this market is not closed. For example, we were able to significantly increase LNG supplies to Europe this year; they have increased to 19.4 billion cubic meters in 11 months of 2022, and we expect 21 billion cubic meters by the end of the year."
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“Today, we can confidently say that there is a demand for our gas. Therefore, we continue to consider Europe as a potential market for the sale of our products. It is clear that a large-scale campaign was launched against us, which ended with acts of sabotage against Nord Stream."
Notably, Russian gas giant Gazprom, in May, earlier this year had blocked the supplies through the mentioned pipeline which runs across Poland.The stopping of supplies was also necessitated after Gazprom's parent company was sanctioned.
At the time, Warsaw refused to buy the gas from Russia and focused on drawing energy from Germany's stored gas reserves.
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The energy conundrum between the western world and Russia has been ongoing ever since Putin and his men invaded Ukraine. Gas and oil form a pivotal part of Moscow's economy and the West wants to hurt it by imposing sanctions.
However, in the absence of reliable alternatives that can supply energy on scale - the ploy of sanctions has not worked as well as it was supposed to.
After months of dillydallying, theG7 nations, the European Union and Australia, earlier this month agreed to a price ceiling of $60 per barrel of seaborne Russian Urals crude oil.
Thus, experts are surprised that Moscow is willing to resume gas supplies through theYamal-Europe pipeline.
(With inputs from agencies)
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