The Kremlin's blackmail

Impending gas outages: Moldova declares state of emergency

The Republic of Moldova receives Russian natural gas via Ukraine, which does not want to extend its transit contract with the Russian gas giant Gazprom.(Bild: ASSOCIATED PRESS)

The parliament of the Republic of Moldova decided early Friday morning to declare a state of emergency due to the threat of Russian gas supply shortfalls.

A national state of emergency is to be declared for 60 days from December 16, as Russian gas supplies are expected to be interrupted from January 1. 56 members of the 101-seat chamber voted in favor of the measure shortly after midnight.

It is up to parliament to approve the state of emergency, demanded Prime Minister Dorin Recean, so that "this winter must be the last in the country's history in which we can be blackmailed with energy". The "blackmail with gas" by Moscow must be ended and he also wants to ensure that Transnistria, a region on the Moldovan-Ukrainian border, receives the gas it urgently needs, Recean added. The declaration of a state of emergency allows the government to react quickly and curb energy exports.

Ukraine does not want to extend transit contract with Gazprom
The Republic of Moldova receives Russian natural gas via Ukraine, which does not want to extend its transit contract with the Russian gas giant Gazprom. The contract expires on December 31. The Republic of Moldova receives around two billion cubic meters of gas from Russia every year. Since 2022, Transnistria and the central government have agreed that all Russian gas received by the Republic of Moldova will flow to Transnistria. Transnistria is home to a power plant fueled by Russian gas, which is crucial to the region's economy and also supplies most of the energy for the government-controlled areas of Moldova. Transnistria, which is not internationally recognized, has already declared its own economic emergency on Tuesday.

According to Moldova, an alternative route to Transnistria could be to route Russian gas via the TurkStream pipeline to Turkey and then through Bulgaria and Romania. However, the supplies could be called into question as Gazprom has linked the continuation of supplies via alternative routes to the requirement that Moldova must first settle its debts for previous supplies, which according to Russian calculations amount to 709 million US dollars.