EU's gas delivery issues would be self-inflicted, says Russia
Russia contends that any problems delivering gas to Europe are the result of self-imposed restrictions.
So says Russian President Vladimir Putin’s press secretary Dmitry Peskov Thursday during a press conference, as reported by AFP.
The statement comes on the same day as the Nord Stream 1 pipeline has begun transmitting gas from Russia to Europe again. For the past ten days, the pipeline has been undergoing maintenance, leading to a disruption of the gas supply.
Ahead of the restart Thursday, there was an atmosphere of concern as to whether Russia would resume gas deliveries to Europe or would instead use the opportunity to halt deliveries entirely.
According to Peskov, Russia has no interest in causing problems for the supply of gas to Europe. Instead, Europe’s own restrictions are causing the problems, he says.
”Any technical difficulties linked to this are caused by those restrictions that European countries introduced themselves,” he remarks, according to AFP.
On Wednesday, President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen said that she considers it a ”likely” scenario that Russia completely cuts off gas to the EU.
”Russia is blackmailing us. Russia is using energy as a weapon. Therefore, in any event, whether it is a partial or a major cut-off of Russian gas, or a total cut-off of Russian gas, Europe needs to be ready,” said von der Leyen in a statement earlier in the day.
The Russian spokesperson dismisses the accusations that Russia uses gas deliveries as political blackmail as being ”completely” unfounded.
A spokesperson for Nord Stream AG, which oversees operations of the pipeline, has informed Thursday that gas deliveries through Nord Stream 1 were still below capacity.
In his view, it will take some time before the gas flow is back to normal.
Volumes will reportedly match the level from before the upkeep operation, the spokesperson notes, meaning around 40% of maximum transmission capacity.
This will result in daily gas flow of 67 million cubic meters from Russia to Germany. When operating at full power, the pipeline is able to transmit approx. 167 million cubic meters of gas per day.
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