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Advocates for ideas and draws conclusions based on the author/producer’s interpretation of facts and data.
When Russia invaded Ukraine, shell-shocked European leaders gathered in Versailles to call time on the Kremlin as the bloc’s energy supplier. What started as a wish could become reality this summer.
Today the EU gets around 13% of its gas from Russia – down from 45% before the war. Russian oil imports are now at 3% when previously they accounted for 20%, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in Strasbourg on Wednesday.
Yet this is not some grand European achievement, as some may suggest. Rather, it is the result of the Kremlin turning off the gas tap and a G7 effort to sanction ships transporting Ural crude.
Only Russian coal, where imports are down to zero, has been effectively targeted by EU sanctions. The pipeline-bound oil sanctions came with generous exemptions for Eastern Europe.
The truth is that Brussels has been half-hearted when it comes to tackling Russian energy in Europe’s veins; EU countries simply wouldn't go without. That's until yesterday, when the EU executive promised a swathe of legal proposals that will remove Kremlin gas and enriched uranium from the bloc.
Measures include forcing companies to disclose where the gas they’re buying comes from, a ban on buying Russian gas on short-term markets as early as this year, and severing long-term contracts in 2027.
There will also be tariffs on Russian uranium to force Slovakia, Hungary, the Czechs and Finland to buy from Western companies. These very real laws will be negotiated by MEPs and EU countries in the bloc’s “ordinary” legislative process once proposed by the end of June.
The reactions from behind the former Iron Curtain all but prove their potential efficacy. Slovak PM Robert Fico fumed that the plan is “totally unacceptable” at a quickly convened press conference today. Hungarian FM Péter Szijjártó said it “violates sovereignty”.
Fico says Spain and Czechia could also weigh in on the fight against the roadmap. But even if the left-wing government in Madrid joined the Eastern European cause, they wouldn't have the majority needed to block the proposed laws.
“This is a matter of political will,” von der Leyen told MEPs. If all goes well, “the age of Russian fossil fuels in Europe is coming to an end”. She didn't say anything about uranium, perhaps too used to the old hydrocarbon formula.
Yet for once, she may be right. Her party, the centre-right EPP, has signalled its tentative support, and so have the Socialists.
In fact, it's unlikely anything will keep Russian energies in the EU. Only a Ukraine settlement that forces Europe to continue buying from the Kremlin — and at the rate Brussels and Washington are divorcing, maybe not even that.
Roundup
Farmers get MEPs on board – After strong lobbying, the European Parliament backed calls for extra funding for farmers in the next seven-year budget.Who's crying over Russian gas? – Bratislava and Budapest were strongly critical of the roadmap to move beyond Russian energies as they remain heavily reliant on supplies from Gazprom.
Franco-German love-in – Newly elected German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron have pledged to "make Europe more sovereign" by developing the continent’s defence and boosting its competitiveness.
Across Europe
Hunting Merz's conspirators – Never before had parliament effectively rejected a chancellor nominee. It was a monumental 'Schmach', a humiliation.
Waiting for the white smoke – The Vatican's 133 cardinal electors are gathering in Rome to elect the new Pope in a vote described as one of the most unpredictable in recent centuries.
Still fighting over fish – London has sanctioned a French vessel for breaching a ban on bottom fishing in a marine conservation zone, the first prosecution under a restriction that irks Brussels.
(ow)
