Gazprom Cuts Supplies to Europe

[Dover]

Thursday, Feb. 19, 2004. Page 1

Gazprom Cuts Supplies to Europe

By Catherine Belton and Valeria Korchagina
Staff Writers Gazprom took the unprecedented step Wednesday of cutting all gas supplies to Belarus and via its territory to Germany and Poland, a hardball move in a conflict over prices and pipelines that is likely to seriously rock relations between Moscow and Minsk.

Gazprom said it was forced to block the Belarus transit route because Belarus had started siphoning off gas from its export pipeline into Europe. The alleged theft came after Minsk failed to clinch a new deal on gaining its own domestic supplies amid an escalating price dispute with Gazprom.

Gazprom supplies one quarter of all Europe's gas needs. About 17 percent of that amount, or 22 billion to 24 billion cubic meters, is supplied via Belarus. Poland has enough stored gas and alternative supply sources to keep going without any problems for several weeks, while Germany has enough for many months, analysts said.

Gazprom said it could compensate for the loss by using reserve capacity in its pipelines into Europe via Ukraine, but only partly. It would not specify how much.....cont'd

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2004/02/19/001.html

[donsu]

1. the fighting over gas & oil will only get worse as supplies decrease

nt