Report: Germany abstained from Russian gas sanctions deliberately

BERLIN/MOSCOW, Nov 14 (PRIME) -- Germany has not introduced sanctions on Russian natural gas as many countries were dependent on it, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said in an interview to NDR vor Ort TV show aired late on November 11.

“We did not impose sanctions on gas, there were no sanctions on gas. Neither Germany, nor the E.U. or the G7 countries imposed these sanctions,” he said, adding that Berlin knew how many countries were dependent on Russian gas and that Germany did not want to hurt them.

“We received only half of gas from Russia, but some others are 80–90% dependent because of historic events to the larger extent, they were located further East and their infrastructure is built that way,” he said.

An E.U. source told PRIME that the E.U. was considering a ban on imports of Russian diamonds and some metals in the framework of a new sanction package that would eliminate the gaps in the previous sanctionss. At the same time, Brussels is hesitant about the new sanctions because of the sanction fatigue and a lack of the instruments of pressure. The union has already used the majority of the instruments it had, the source said.

Reuters also reported that the continuous disagreements among the E.U. member countries raise the chances that the E.U. energy ministers would be unable approve the gas price restrictions finally at a meeting on November 24.

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