Belarus has become a hostage to Polish relations with Gazprom and is suffering economic losses.
Leading analyst of the National Energy Security Fund Igor Yushkov stated this in an interview with Sputnik Belarus radio station, PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“Belarus is becoming a hostage to Polish relations with Gazprom.” The fact is that in 2020, the long-term agreement for gas transit through Poland via the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline ended. Poland has switched to the European capacity contracting system. She regularly holds auctions. Gazprom uses Yamal-Europe as a balancing route. If there are more requests from Europe, then he will use this gas pipeline. If demand in Europe falls, as in the last six months, the first route that Gazprom cuts is Yamal-Europe,” Yushkov said.
He clarified that Gazprom fully meets the gas needs of Belarus and Poland, but practically no gas is currently supplied to Germany via the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline.
“The fact is that Gazprom delivers gas to Germany itself through Nord Stream 1. It is used even more than the designed capacity: 59 billion cubic meters with a designed capacity of 55 billion cubic meters. Now this volume is enough for German companies, so from time to time Yamal-Europe either reduces the volume of pumping or stops altogether,” Yushkov said.