Desk Report
Publish: 30 Apr 2022, 11:04 am
Russian President Vladimir Putin || Photo: Collected
European energy companies are scrambling to find a
workaround that allows them to pay for Russian gas without falling foul of EU
sanctions, amid political chaos sparked by the Kremlin’s decision to cut off supplies
to Poland and Bulgaria.
Big gas distributors in Germany and Austria confirmed they
were exploring ways to continue to make payments after Putin signed a decree at
the end of March calling for a “special procedure for foreign buyers’
fulfillment of obligations to Russian suppliers of natural gas”.
The decree stipulates that non-Russian buyers of gas must
pay in roubles, opening special “K” type rouble and foreign currency accounts
at Gazprombank, the third-largest bank in Russia. Gazprombank was set up to be
a service provider to Gazprom, the state-owned gas producer that has a monopoly
on exports via gas pipelines to Europe.
Germany’s economy minister, Robert Habeck, suggested on
Thursday that Berlin could comply. “The payments will be made in euros and then
transferred by Gazprombank into a so-called K account,” he said, insisting this
was “compatible with sanctions”.
But hours later, a spokesperson for the European Commission
said: “Complying with the decree is a breach of sanctions. If companies pay in
euros, they are not in breach of the sanctions. What we cannot accept is that
companies are obliged to open a second account in roubles and that the payment
is complete only when payment is converted into roubles.”
EU energy ministers are due to meet on Monday, where the
capitals will try to forge a common line for companies to follow.
On Thursday the German distributor Uniper and Austria’s OMV
confirmed they were examining methods of complying with both the decree and the
sanctions regime.
Firms could turn to legal guidance issued by the EU last
week, which said it “appears possible” to send money to Gazprombank without
breaching sanctions.
The guidance states that this would rely on a declaration
from one or both signatories to the gas purchase contract that the transaction
is completed once the initial euro or dollar payment has been made and before
any conversion of the cash into roubles.
In theory, this would avoid a European state or private
energy company being complicit in a currency conversion involving Russia’s
central bank, which is subject to sanctions. However, the EU advised gas
companies to “seek confirmation from the Russian side” that this was allowable
under Putin’s decree 172, the order that requires “unfriendly” foreign powers to
pay for their gas in roubles.
A spokesperson for Uniper, one of Germany’s main buyers of
gas from Russia, confirmed on Thursday it was in talks with Gazprom “in close
coordination with the German government” over “concrete payment modalities”,
but said it would continue to pay in euros for now.
“Uniper can say for its contracts, we consider a payment
conversion compliant with sanctions law and the Russian decree to be possible,”
the spokesperson said. “For our company and for Germany as a whole, it is not
possible to do without Russian gas in the short term; this would have dramatic
consequences for our economy.”
OMV, an Austrian oil and gas company, is also looking at
ways to pay for gas without contravening EU sanctions. In a statement OMV said:
“We have analysed the Gazprom request about payment methods in light of the EU
sanctions and are now working on a sanctions-compliant solution.”
The Financial Times reported that companies in Hungary and
Slovakia, as well as Italy’s Eni, were also considering signing up for Russian
accounts in the hope of securing continued supplies.
Poland and Bulgaria have taken a defiant position, refusing
to sign up to Putin’s preferred arrangement under any conditions. Poland’s
prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, described Russia’s retaliatory suspension
of gas supplies as a “direct attack”.
However, Germany, Europe’s largest economy and largest
Russian gas user, has adopted a more emollient tone amid fears – disputed by
some analysts – that an embargo would be impossible without crashing its economy.
Anna Moskwa, Poland’s climate and environment minister, said
“full sanctions on gas” would put to bed the question of whether firms could
still buy Russian gas.
The main EU member states resisting tougher gas sanctions on
Russia were Austria, Germany and Hungary, she added. “We are counting on there
being consequences for these countries [which seek to comply with Putin’s
rouble payment decree] and that as a result they will cease paying in roubles.”
The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen,
said on Wednesday that the Kremlin was using “fossil fuels to try to blackmail
us”, and that the EU was seeking to reduce its reliance on Russian gas by
importing more from the US. However, the EU has not attempted to impose
sanctions on Gazprom or Gazprombank.
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