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EU wants to reduce Russian gas consumption as missiles hit Ukraine – AFR

The European Union on Tuesday agreed to cut gas consumption to break its dependency on Russia, as rocket attacks on Ukraine’s Black Sea coast raised doubts over a grain export deal.

Efforts to help Germany wean itself off Russian gas for the winter came as Turkey announced a meeting between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Russia next week.

Erdogan wants Turkey – which has good relations with both Moscow and Kyiv – to be at the center of diplomatic efforts to stop the five-month war, just as the EU took another big step to sever ties with Moscow.

The cut in EU gas consumption, endorsed by energy ministers in Brussels, has been hailed as an effective response to Russia’s manipulation of its energy wealth as an economic weapon.

The plan nominally obliges EU countries to reduce their winter gas consumption by 15 percent, although exceptions have been made for some countries and Hungary rejected the deal as “useless”.

“We have taken a big step to ensure gas supplies for our citizens and economies for the coming winter,” said Czech Industry Minister Jozef Sikela, whose country holds the rotating EU Council Presidency.

“I know it wasn’t an easy decision, but I think in the end everyone understands that this sacrifice is necessary,” he added.

Hungary was the only country to oppose the plan, which passed by a majority, further isolating Budapest as the only member state unwilling to take further action against Russia.

“This is an unjustifiable, useless, unenforceable and harmful proposal that completely ignores national interests,” said Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto.

The deal “is purely for communication purposes and aims to salvage the credibility of some Western European politicians,” he added.

– German ‘Error’ –

Germany, the EU’s economic powerhouse, is heavily dependent on Russian gas. Berlin accounts for a large share of the 40 percent of EU gas imports that came from Russia last year.

“It is true that Germany made a strategic mistake with its dependence on Russian gas, but our government is working to correct this,” said German Economics Minister Robert Habeck.

The plan asks member states to voluntarily reduce gas consumption by 15 percent – based on a five-year average for the months concerned – from next month and the following winter through March.

The target will be adjusted to each country’s situation, taking into account the level of reserves and whether or not they have gas-sharing pipelines.

There were exceptions for island states such as Ireland, Cyprus or Malta as well as for Spain or Portugal, which are only connected to the gas grid to a limited extent.

The Baltic countries will be exempt if their power connections to the Russian grid are cut.

In the final proposal, EU member countries also rewrote an earlier plan by the European Commission to give Brussels – rather than member states – the power to impose emergency gas cuts.

The regulation now provides for the possibility of raising a “union alert” that would make the target binding, but the decision would lie with member states, a statement said.

The deal came a day after Gazprom announced it would cut daily gas supplies to Europe to about 20 percent of capacity from Wednesday.

Gazprom put forward technical reasons for cutting supplies, but EU Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson dismissed the claim.

“This is a politically motivated move and we need to be prepared for it, and that’s exactly why pre-emptively reducing our gas needs is a smart strategy,” she said.

The extent of Russia’s division with the West over Ukraine was also underscored by Moscow’s announcement that it would leave the International Space Station after 2024.

So far, space exploration has been one of the few areas where cooperation between Russia, the United States and their allies has not been shattered by tensions in Ukraine and elsewhere.

The decision to leave the ISS program “has been made,” Roscosmos boss Yuri Borissov told Putin.

– Strikes near Odessa –

Meanwhile, fighting continued in Ukraine. Kyiv said Russian forces had launched multiple rocket attacks on targets on the Black Sea coast near the southern port city of Odessa and in Mykolaiv.

The attacks come days after Russian strikes in Odessa and call into question a landmark deal to resume grain exports from Ukraine that was disrupted by the invasion of Moscow.

Rescuers were working on the ground near Odessa where “residential buildings” near the coast were hit in the strikes, Ukraine’s Southern Military Command said on Facebook.

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