European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen suggesting replacing Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) with U.S. exports in a phone conversation with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Nov. 8.
Von der Leyen spoke with Trump three days after his victory in the Nov. 5 presidential election.
Replacing Europe’s supplies of Russian LNG was “one of the topics” the two leaders discussed, von der Leyen told reporters in Budapest.
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The European Union imposed its first major restrictions on Russian gas, including LNG, in its 14th sanctions package in June. Russia still remains Europe’s second-largest importer of LNG, after the U.S.
I find super funny that they tried to impose sanctions to something we are 100% depending on. And instead of, you know, fixing the problem of dependency, they’ll switch to a different dealer.
The dependency was massively reduced just in 2022 post invasion, but you can’t just go cold turkey.
There are multiple sources for it and they only sanction one of them.
We didn’t really stop importing Russian gas, there’s still long-term contracts if e.g. Austria refused to accept Russian gas they’d still have to pay for it. Situation is different with Germany as there Russia broke the contract, stopped deliveries even though Germany was paying, so the country got out of the long-term contract for free.
When it comes to self-sanctioning have a look at Russia sanctioning European food exports. Not that the Faroese would ever complain, of course, they’re selling tons of fish to Russia right now who can blame them their yearly GDP is like three patriot batteries.