“Not in their interests”: why the Russian Foreign Ministry questioned Europe’s readiness to completely cut ties with Russia

A complete severing of ties with Russia and switching to American liquefied natural gas is hardly in the interests of Europe.

This was stated by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in an interview with RT and RIA Novosti.

“I don’t think it’s in their interest to completely cut off all ties with us and switch to liquefied natural gas, which the Americans are trying to foist on them,” Lavrov said in an interview with Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of the RT television channel and the Rossiya Segodnya media group.

At the same time, if Europe suddenly changes its position and offers to restore relations, it will be necessary to understand whether this is beneficial for Russia, the head of Russian diplomacy added.

“If at some stage Europe suddenly says: “We got excited, we are still interested, let’s restore our relations in some economic and trade areas,” I think, then they should not be pushed away.

But we need to see how beneficial it is for us, and only then react,” Lavrov said.

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Contrary to interests

Recall that the countries of Europe decided to abandon the import of Russian energy carriers after the start of the special operation of the Russian Federation in Ukraine.

This was preceded by an explosive increase in gas prices in the European market, which began in the fall of 2021.

Despite this, along with the introduction of broad economic sanctions against the Russian Federation, the EU decided to find a replacement for Russian fuel.

Thus, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, speaking on June 20 in the Senate of the National Parliament in connection with the political crisis, said that Rome's "unacceptable" dependence on Russian gas supplies was and became "the result of decades of dangerous and short-sighted decisions."

“In a few months, we have reduced Russian gas imports from 40% to less than 25% of the total volume and intend to bring it to zero within a year and a half,” said Draghi, quoted by RIA Novosti.

Earlier, during his visit to Algeria, Draghi noted that this country has become the main supplier of natural gas to Italy.

The head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, for her part, on July 18 announced her intention to increase gas imports from Azerbaijan.

The short-sighted politicized decisions of the EU authorities led to a difficult situation in the European energy sector, analysts remind.

Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov, commenting on the situation in European energy in May, noted that one of the reasons for the current state of affairs was the freezing of the Nord Stream 2 project, which the United States and Eastern European countries, including Ukraine, so sought.

In turn, Russian President Vladimir Putin, during a working trip to Iran on July 19, said that the reason for the rise in energy prices in Western countries was the actions of their governments.

“Investment in fixed capital in traditional energy has fallen due to earlier political decisions (West. -

).

Banks do not finance, insurance companies do not insure, local authorities do not allocate land for new developments, they do not develop pipeline and other transport.

This is the result of the policy for the previous decade,” the Russian leader said.

In addition, Europe has relied on alternative energy, which did not justify the hopes placed on it, Vladimir Putin added.

“They are great specialists in the field of non-traditional relationships.

So in the field of energy, they decided to rely on non-traditional types of energy: the sun, wind energy.

The winter has been long.

There was no wind.

That's all," the President of the Russian Federation explained.

He also recalled that the West blames Gazprom for the energy crisis, although it itself imposed sanctions and closed energy routes.

Polish sanctions against the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline have led to a new increase in gas prices in the European market, Vladimir Putin added.

Despite this, as the Russian leader assured, "Gazprom" will always fulfill its obligations for the supply of energy, and shifting Western countries of their mistakes in the energy sector on Russia has no grounds.

Political dependency

Analysts state that in the current situation, Brussels is acting against its economic and national interests.

“Europe's interests are consistent with an even, stable and economically mutually beneficial relationship with Russia, but she has done everything to destroy them.

Why?

Europe does not pursue a completely independent foreign policy.

In fact, it has given up its sovereign geostrategic role, its position as a global player.

Now Europe is dependent on Washington, which provides it with military cover, but at the same time promotes only its own geopolitical interests, ”said Vladimir Bruter, a political scientist and expert at the International Institute for Humanitarian and Political Studies, in an interview with RT.

• Gas infrastructure

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Russia, in turn, provided the EU with cheap and stable raw materials, giving the union the opportunity to live well without making any special efforts, the expert emphasized.

“It’s good to live, on the one hand, at the expense of Russian energy sources, and on the other hand, at the expense of the American “roof”, weapons and geopolitical dominance.

Now that a specific situation has developed, Europe, being a vassal dependent on Washington, unambiguously took its side and thus was forced to destroy relations with Russia.

She did not have the opportunity to choose, because subjective and objective factors did not allow her to do so," Bruter explained.

At the same time, he expressed confidence that normal relations between Europe and Russia were interrupted for a long time.

“Is it bad for Europe?

Yes, very bad, but it could have been foreseen, and this is not the case for Europeans to say: “Oh, this has never happened, and here it is again.”

This was the most likely and predictable scenario,” the expert added.

From his point of view, numerous statements by European politicians that the EU is now eliminating dependence on energy from the Russian Federation have a double meaning.

“In fact, they were not hindered by the notorious dependence on Russian gas and oil, they simply wanted to trade in Russian energy carriers so that all or most of the profit from this would remain with them.

And we see this, they immediately seized Russian assets, which were formed to a large extent by trading in energy resources.

They simply and without any hesitation took away all the Russian money that Moscow received from trade that was profitable for them, ”says Bruter.

Political scientist Alexander Asafov, in turn, believes that Europe is unlikely to be able to neglect economic ties with Russia for a long time, so Brussels is now trying to find ways to circumvent the sanctions it has imposed.

“They are looking for an opportunity to keep economic ties somewhere, hide them, find workarounds.

Something similar, but to a much lesser extent, happened when Europe was looking for a way to circumvent US sanctions against Iran.

Now, despite the sharp anti-Russian rhetoric of Western leaders, there is also a search for workarounds to maintain and restore cooperation, ”the political scientist believes.

In his opinion, the current EU policy towards energy from Russia was completely shaped by Washington to capture the European market.

“Since it is obvious that American liquefied natural gas (LNG) is much more expensive and more difficult in logistics, it was decided to act by political methods.

They coined the term “European energy security” in order to gradually squeeze Russian pipeline gas from the market and replace it with American LNG,” he explained.

For the same purpose, terminals for receiving LNG were built in Poland, which supposedly should have led to a decrease in Europe's political dependence on commercially profitable gas from Russia, the political scientist recalled.

“But it didn’t work out, although the process has been going on since 2015.

Until now, it is very difficult, since neither American, nor Norwegian, nor Azerbaijani gas can compete with Russian,” the expert said.

From his point of view, even in the event of a potential change in the position of Europe, taking into account the current situation, the Russian side should henceforth think first of all about its own interests.

“Any cooperation in this sense should be beneficial to Russia.

The most outspoken US sympathizers, such as Poland, will certainly pay a high price for this, just as Warsaw now buys gas from Germany, carefully pretending that it is not Russian.

Britain, despite being one of the main managers of the anti-Russian project, is also forced to buy Russian hydrocarbons, only bypassing it.

For unfriendly countries, accordingly, the market situation will be unpleasant, but for everyone else who is ready to talk and comply with the agreements reached, Russia is open to mutually beneficial trade cooperation, ”Asafov concluded.