EU countries yesterday agreed to phase out their remaining gas imports from Russia by the end of 2027, breaking a dependency the bloc has struggled to end despite Moscow’s war on Ukraine.
Energy ministers meeting in Luxembourg approved a plan by the European Commission to phase out pipeline gas and liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports from Russia, subject to approval by the bloc’s parliament.
Lars Aagaard, minister for climate, energy and utilities of Denmark, which holds the EU’s rotating presidency, called it a “crucial” step to make Europe energy independent.
Photo:Reuters
The plan is part of a broader EU strategy to wean the bloc off Russian energy supplies.
“Although we have worked hard and pushed to get Russian gas and oil out of Europe in recent years, we are not there yet,” Aagaard said.
The commission is in parallel pushing for LNG imports to be phased out one year earlier, by January 2027, as part of a new package of sanctions aimed at sapping Moscow’s war chest.
However, sanctions need unanimous approval from the EU’s 27 nations, which has at times been hard to reach. Trade restrictions like those approved yesterday instead require the backing of a weighted majority of 15 countries.
All but Hungary and Slovakia, which are diplomatically closer to the Kremlin and still import Russian gas via pipeline, supported the latest move, diplomats said.
“The real impact of this regulation is that our safe supply of energy in Hungary is going to be killed,” Budapest’s top diplomat, Peter Szijjarto, told reporters.
His government says the landlocked country needs to import gas from Russia due to geographical constraints.
Under the proposal, Russian gas imports under new contracts would be banned as of Jan. 1 next year. Existing contracts would benefit from a transition period, with inflows under short-term contracts allowed until June 17 next year and those under long-term contracts until Jan. 1, 2028.
Although gas imports from Russia via pipeline have fallen sharply since the invasion of Ukraine, several European countries have increased their purchases of Russian LNG transported by sea.
Russian gas still accounts for an estimated 13 percent of EU imports this year, worth more than 15 billion euros (US$17.5 billion), according to Brussels.
The Venezuelan government on Monday said that it would close its embassies in Norway and Australia, and open new ones in Burkina Faso and Zimbabwe in a restructuring of its foreign service, after weeks of growing tensions with the US. The closures are part of the “strategic reassignation of resources,” Venezueland President Nicolas Maduro’s government said in a statement, adding that consular services to Venezuelans in Norway and Australia would be provided by diplomatic missions, with details to be shared in the coming days. The Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that it had received notice of the embassy closure, but no
A missing fingertip offers a clue to Mako Nishimura’s criminal past as one of Japan’s few female yakuza, but after clawing her way out of the underworld, she now spends her days helping other retired gangsters reintegrate into society. The multibillion-dollar yakuza organized crime network has long ruled over Japan’s drug rings, illicit gambling dens and sex trade. In the past few years, the empire has started to crumble as members have dwindled and laws targeting mafia are tightened. An intensifying police crackdown has shrunk yakuza forces nationwide, with their numbers dipping below 20,000 last year for the first time since records
EXTRADITION FEARS: The legislative changes come five years after a treaty was suspended in response to the territory’s crackdown on democracy advocates Exiled Hong Kong dissidents said they fear UK government plans to restart some extraditions with the territory could put them in greater danger, adding that Hong Kong authorities would use any pretext to pursue them. An amendment to UK extradition laws was passed on Tuesday. It came more than five years after the UK and several other countries suspended extradition treaties with Hong Kong in response to a government crackdown on the democracy movement and its imposition of a National Security Law. The British Home Office said that the suspension of the treaty made all extraditions with Hong Kong impossible “even if
Former Japanese prime minister Tomiichi Murayama, best known for making a statement apologizing over World War II, died yesterday aged 101, officials said. Murayama in 1995 expressed “deep remorse” over the country’s atrocities in Asia. The statement became a benchmark for Tokyo’s subsequent apologies over World War II. “Tomiichi Murayama, the father of Japanese politics, passed away today at 11:28am at a hospital in Oita City at the age of 101,” Social Democratic Party Chairwoman Mizuho Fukushima said. Party Secretary-General Hiroyuki Takano said he had been informed that the former prime minister died of old age. In the landmark statement in August 1995, Murayama said
RSS