The European Union will exempt gas from key suppliers, including the United States and Qatar, from additional checks as part of its planned ban on Russian gas, Reuters reported, citing a draft European Commission document.
On January 26, the EU Council approved a complete ban on imports of Russian liquefied natural gas from the beginning of 2027 and on pipeline gas from Russia from September 30 of the same year.
To implement the ban, the bloc will introduce a “prior authorisation” procedure for supplies of liquefied. This means that companies must provide European customs authorities with proof of the country of origin of the gas five days before it arrives in the EU.
However, this requirement will not apply to existing key suppliers or to countries where the EU considers the risk of Russian gas entering their exports to be low. These are countries that have voluntarily refused Russian gas or do not have import infrastructure through which Russian supplies could enter their network.
According to the draft document, the exceptions include the United States, Norway, Qatar, the United Kingdom, Algeria and Nigeria.
Under the EU plan, violating the ban would result in fines for European companies of at least 40 million euros, or at least 3.5% of their annual global turnover, or 300% of their transaction turnover.
After the plan was approved, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico announced that Hungary and Slovakia would file two separate cases with the Court of Justice of the European Union in connection with the European Council's decision to ban Russian gas imports. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban also announced his intention to fight the ban on Russian energy imports.
The Kremlin said that Europe's refusal to accept Russian gas supplies would make European countries dependent on the United States and deprive them of the opportunity to diversify their supplies. Spokesman Dmitry Peskov explained that the United States sells gas "very expensively", which will have negative consequences for European industry.
Moscow considers Western sanctions illegal. President Vladimir Putin said that European countries that have refused Russian energy supplies have faced a decline in industrial production, a decline in competitiveness and a rise in prices.