Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico believes that the European Commission will succeed in reaching a decision to stop the import of Russian gas to the European Union.
He made a video address on his Facebook page after a meeting with EC President Ursula von der Leyen.
Fico explained that the proposal will be adopted by a qualified majority vote of EU countries. “And although we will be against it, this proposal will be adopted. In practice, this will mean that gas will not flow from east to west, and Slovakia will be supplied from other sources - from the north, south and west. This will mean a significant increase in transit tariff payments for Slovakia“, the Prime Minister said.
He discussed with Von der Leyen the possibility of minimizing transit tariffs and gas prices for Slovakia in the event of a suspension of gas imports from the Russian Federation from January 1, 2028. If effective measures are not taken to prevent the negative consequences of the refusal of Russian raw materials, the price of gas for Slovak consumers could increase by 30-50%.
Fico stressed that Slovakia has contracts with Gazprom for gas supplies until 2034. The Russian company may demand compensation from Bratislava for unilateral termination through the court. According to the Prime Minister, a possible complaint from Gazprom would be completely understandable, and the republic would have to pay 16-20 billion euros. “These are, of course, questions to which the EC still has no answer“, the head of government noted.
The European Commission, as Fico said, “wants to stop gas flows from Russia to Europe at any cost“, and Slovakia expects the EC to compensate for the damage that will be caused to it by the suspension of Russian gas imports.
“We will continue to negotiate very constructively with the EC about what the EC can do for us to eliminate the damage that this ideological proposal will cause to Slovakia“, Fico stressed.
As Fico noted, Slovakia will propose to postpone the vote on new sanctions against Russia on Friday. If this proposal is not adopted, the republic will veto it, he said.
The primary task, according to the prime minister, is to resolve the situation with the import of energy raw materials.