Bloomberg: Gazprom explained to customers in the EU the procedure for paying for gas without violating sanctions

“Gazprom” explained to customers from Europe the decree of Russian President Vladimir Putin dated May 4 regarding payments for gas in rubles. Bloomberg writes about this with reference to a text at his disposal on May 7.

It follows from the letter that European customers can continue to make ruble payments for gas without violating Western sanctions against Russia, the agency reports.

“Gazprom’s letter says that the order ensures the transparency of the movement of funds from foreign buyers and excludes the possibility of participation in the calculations of any” third party “, – the publication says.

Earlier, on May 4, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on the temporary procedure for fulfilling financial obligations in the field of corporate relations to certain foreign creditors. The document states that “after the receipt of funds from a foreign buyer to a special currency account of type “K”, the authorized bank “transfers them to correspondent accounts of a non-bank credit institution – the central counterparty “National Clearing Center”. After that, the money is credited to the accounts that ensure the implementation of settlements on foreign currency purchase and sale transactions.

Bloomberg stressed that it is currently unclear whether the new order will be enough to allay the fears of the European Union, which said that opening a ruble account would violate sanctions.

The day before, Aleksey Belogoriev, Deputy Chief Director for Energy at the Institute of Energy and Finance, said that since May 1, there has been an explosive growth in Russian pipeline gas supplies to the EU countries relative to the low levels of April. According to him, according to ENTSO-G, deliveries to Finland increased by 4.8 times from April 30 to May 4.

Prior to this, on May 5, the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, said that at the moment the European Union does not plan to refuse Russian gas supplies. However, the sixth package of anti-Russian sanctions includes a ban on Russian oil supplies.

Against the backdrop of anti-Russian sanctions on March 23, the Russian leader announced that the country would switch to paying for gas supplies to unfriendly states in rubles. On March 31, a corresponding decree was signed. Buyers had to open ruble accounts from which gas payments are made. After that, some Western countries said they were not going to follow Moscow’s demand. So, due to the refusal of Bulgaria and Poland to switch to this scheme, on April 27, Gazprom stopped deliveries to these countries. At the same time, on May 1, the head of the office of the Hungarian Prime Minister, Gergely Guiyash, said on Rádió Kossuth that Hungary, along with nine other countries, had already opened accounts with a Russian bank to pay for gas according to the proposed rules.