Russia halts Natural Gas Supplies to Poland and Bulgaria

On Tuesday officials of Poland and Bulgaria informed that the Kremlin is cutting off natural gas deliveries to their countries due to their refusal to pay in Russian rubles. After several countries imposed severe sanctions on Russia after its invasion of Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin demanded the countries to pay for the Russian energy in the Russian currency, Ruble. The governments of both the nations said that Gazprom, a Russian state-owned energy major told Poland and Bulgaria that gas supplies will be suspended starting Wednesday. The decision to cut off energy supply will be a grave concern to those countries that are heavily dependent on Russian gas, such as Germany.

However, Polish Ministers told that they had enough supplies to face disruption. Other than this the Polish Ministers also accused Gazprom of a breach of contract. Anna Moskwa, Poland’s minister for climate, said: “There are no worries about shortages of gas in our homes. It is worth pointing out that liquified natural gas alone supplies the market sufficiently. LNG deliveries in [terminal] Świnoujście are growing – in 2015 there was one, in 2021 it was already 35. As of today, it provides for about 50 deliveries.”