Winter just came

In fact, the speech of the head of the Ukrainian Naftogaz Yuriy Vitrenko, which took place last weekend, completely caricature in form and absolutely outstanding in content, stated that the decision of the German Federal Network Agency (BNA), allowing the operator Nord Stream 2 AG to create a German subsidiary, is “A mockery of the rules of the European Union”, by and large, could have been left without our and European close attention altogether.

You never know what these strange Eastern European natives, who with their own hands actually transferred the role of "the main Russian gas hub of Europe" to the Germans, will slander.

They won and theirs, excuse our French, the main “phallic symbol of independence” - the famous “pipe” of the Ukrainian GTS - changed (in this symbolic sense of the word) to a “record height flagpole” with a dirty Bandera rag dangling on it, battered by history moths.

Moreover, they did it completely voluntarily, and no one, except themselves, seems to be to blame for what is happening, to the great joy of real Europeans.

Therefore, let this Vitrenko say to himself whatever his heart desires: no matter what the child is having fun ... The caravan still goes, and he does it in the right direction.

And everything else is particular, perhaps even looking quite piquant.

But they have nothing to do with the real state of affairs.

Alas.

And all this would be so, perhaps, and it would have been, if not for one, excuse me, unexpectedly happened “circumstance”: winter has come in Europe after all.

Moreover, she did this, even despite the widespread ban for European officials, for the sake of tolerance and other LGBT values, the traditional celebration of a bright Catholic Christmas.

By the way, just for Catholics (in contrast to Orthodox Christians who prefer Easter, it happened so historically) - the main religious holiday of the year.

And the main symbol of the mild European winter.

But this is already so, in particular ...

What can I say here.

It is unlikely, of course, that what is happening can be considered a terrible revenge of the Russians for the ban on Christmas and Santa Claus.

But, in fairness, there is still something in this.

At least for Western Europeans, of course, much more interesting and more important than the regular howls of the “main mouthpiece of the Ukrainian energy industry” was the statement on the topic of interest to everyone by the Italian economic commissioner Paolo Gentiloni. Who spoke last Saturday at the international conference "Mediterranean Dialogues" with actually indirect accusations of Russia. And with the assertion that Gazprom's supplies of Russian gas to the European Union in October-November decreased by more than a quarter compared to the same period last year, 2020. At the same time, in fairness, the European Commissioner nevertheless left the direct accusations of the Russian authorities in what was happening, separately noting, literally, that "the crisis should not go beyond a certain level."

Nevertheless, according to Gentiloni, in spite of everything, the European markets are now receiving Norwegian and Algerian gas, again literally, "in full volume", while Europe still decisively lacks natural gas.

But "gas supplies from Russia in October and November decreased by 25% compared to the same indicators of last year," the European Commissioner summed up, speaking at the aforementioned conference.

Modestly, however, forgetting that the sharp increase in Russian gas supplies to European UGS facilities in the reporting period (ie, at the end of last year) was associated exclusively with the “sanctioned” suspension of the construction of Nord Stream 2 AG.

And by the way, with fears due to the lack of clarity on the "Ukrainian transit": at that time there was a completely illusory chance that an agreement with the Ukrainian side would not be signed at all.

So Gazprom was pumping its free gas to Europe, filling all available storage facilities.

And not out of malice, but simply to get the execution of all their contractual obligations under any, even the most unfavorable, circumstances.

Now there is no such need.

The contractual obligations are already fulfilled by Gazprom flawlessly, if there is such an urgent need from European partners - the concern will easily buy additional capacities from the Poles or from the same Ukrainians.

But for now, we repeat, the European partners of the Russian gas giant apparently simply do not have such a need.

This is, excuse me, in the first place.

And secondly, Senor Gentiloni for some reason quite modestly does not notice such an outstanding part of the European gas markets as the markets, sorry, LNG.

From which the famous American "shale gas" was merged even in those volumes that did not quite coincide with the promised volumes, in which they were present there.

Moreover, which is especially indicative, it merged in the direction of China, with which the Americans urge Europeans to almost fight.

And that the American LNG suppliers somehow suddenly became much closer both politically and almost allied, at least in terms of price.

But what is the point, excuse me, for a person from Brussels to talk about Washington's decisions, even if he is the whole European Commissioner for Economic Affairs?

Not his level of competence - that's, in general, that's all.

Which, by the way - I'm sorry, I can't resist - is the most interesting thing: with the overall annual growth of Gazprom's exports to non-CIS countries by 6.6% (preliminary data, of course), the growth of Russian gas exports to Senor Gentiloni's home and distant from the harsh northern Yamal, beautiful Italy was about 19.5%.

That is, it is exactly three times higher than the "average temperature in the hospital."

Therefore, his "game with numbers" at the Italian conference, by the way, looks like something completely, excuse me, unconvincing even for an ordinary man in the street.

And, of course, the distant Russian "Gazprom" does not bother at all.

Which, to all appearances, at the present moment in time is satisfied with any scenario of the development of events.

Let's say they will launch the long-suffering Nord Stream 2, which has long been ready for a long time, almost tomorrow - well, that means it's just fine.

We are ready to conclude new "long" contracts, it is beneficial for us almost as much as for the Europeans themselves.

Not certified until next summer - well, what can you do.

More precisely, you won't even need to do anything.

Everything is regulated by the price anyway.

Reformatting European energy markets to fit the new economic reality is not a quick question at all; one must be prepared for this from the outset.

Therefore, in fact, let's be honest, neither for the Russian gas giant in the snowy expanses of our homeland, nor for its partners in Europe, nor for politicians in all sorts of high offices from Moscow to Brussels from the duty rituals of Pan Vitrenko and from the slightly cheating figures of Senor Paolo Gentiloni Nothing has changed at all.

Normal concussion.

It's just that winter has come - and this, as it happened, looks much more important.

The point of view of the author may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.