Vladimir Putin signs a decree to impose payment in rubles for Russian gas
Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin on March 31, 2022. AP - Mikhail Klimentyev
Text by: RFI Follow
3 mins
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on Thursday that he had signed a decree requiring buyers from "unfriendly" foreign countries to pay in rubles for deliveries of natural gas as of Friday, and providing for the suspension of current contracts if they do not comply.
Advertising
Read more
Vladimir Putin announced on Thursday that buyers of Russian gas from "unfriendly" countries will have to pay in rubles from accounts in Russia from Friday on pain of being deprived of supplies, a measure mainly affecting the European Union.
However, the price of gas remains denominated in the currency of the current contracts, usually in euros or dollars.
“
They have to open ruble accounts in Russian banks.
And from these accounts they will have to pay for the gas delivered and that starting tomorrow
, ”Vladimir Putin declared on television after signing a decree to this effect.
He added that in the event of refusal, "
the contracts in progress will be stopped
".
“
If these payments are not made, it will be considered a breach of obligations on the part of the buyer, and this will have all the necessary consequences
”, insisted the Russian president.
►Also read: G7: asking for payment of Russian gas in rubles is "not acceptable"
He recalled that this measure was a response to the freezing of some 300 billion dollars of foreign currency reserves that Russia had abroad, a sanction decided by the West in retaliation for the Russian offensive in Ukraine.
Moscow published a list of "unfriendly" countries in early March, which includes the United States, members of the European Union, the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, Switzerland, Taiwan, South Korea, Norway and Australia.
Berlin and Paris categorically refuse to pay in rubles
Germany and France are "
preparing
" for a potential stoppage of Russian gas imports, the governments of both countries have said, which also reiterated their opposition to any payment in rubles for deliveries.
"
There may be a situation in which tomorrow
(...)
there will be no more Russian gas
", and "
it is up to us to prepare these scenarios, and we are preparing them
", declared the French minister of Economy and Finance Bruno Le Maire during a press conference with the German Minister of Economy, Robert Habeck.
Berlin and Paris have at the same time reiterated their refusal to pay in rubles for deliveries of Russian gas, as requested by Vladimir Putin.
“
It is written in the contracts that the payments are made in euros and sometimes in dollars ,”
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz
explained
at a separate press conference also organized on Thursday in Berlin.
"
I made it clear to the Russian president that it will stay that way" and "companies want to be able to pay in euros and will do so
", he added.
"
The contracts provide for a currency in which they are executed and therefore the contracts must be executed in the specified currency
", hammered for his part Bruno Le Maire.
“
Contracts are contracts
,” he added.
Newsletter
Receive all the international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_EN
Russia
Ukraine
France
Germany
European Union
Energies