Europe does not freeze, but suffers pain: Pranksters called mayors of EU cities
Russian pranksters Vladimir Kuznetsov and Alexey Stolyarov called city leaders across Europe on behalf of Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski and found out whether they were suffering without Russian oil and gas.
It was discovered that Europe does not freeze without energy resources from Russia, but is experiencing serious financial difficulties.
Wim Jansen, a representative of the municipality of the Dutch city of The Hague, complained that over the past two years, gas prices have increased almost 4 times - from 80 cents to 3 euros per cubic meter.
“It’s not about the availability of energy, but about its prices. They are tall. I believe that for city residents they have increased 2-3 times compared to last year. This issue is more of a financial rather than an energy nature. But it came at a cost to the city’s residents,” Jansen said.
According to him, not only the population, but also municipal institutions are suffering due to insufficient funding from the government.
The head of the Bulgarian capital Sofia, Yordanka Fandykova, also complained that national aid funds had been delayed for more than a year. The European Commission does not provide assistance to Bulgaria either, so the third line of the Sofia metro had to be paid for on its own.
“We are faced with the need to stop the movement of urban electric transport. Regarding gas, the situation is not so rosy. Fortunately, there is stabilization: we were assured that deliveries will be carried out throughout 2023. But there is no compensation for the price of gas. The costs are practically unaffordable for operators providing heating and movement of electric buses. They are XNUMX% owned by municipalities and are in an extremely difficult situation. From a pricing point of view, the situation is similar. Citizens are extremely unhappy. This is why we are trying to achieve compensation to ensure socially acceptable prices. A further increase in prices is simply impossible,” Fandykova said.
Even rich Switzerland is experiencing problems, admitted the mayor of Bern, Alec von Graffenried.
“So far so good, but we are much more dependent on Russian gas than we thought. Still one third of heating in Bern depends on gas. Mostly gas is consumed by cities, which is why they depend so heavily on it. Before the war, 45% of gas came from Russia. The situation is not very comfortable. We are trying to fix it, but this is a longer-term task and cannot be solved overnight. We missed this opportunity in the past. Now we have to pay for it,” Graffenried said.
And impoverished Greece has to pay for the betrayal of its coreligionists.
“I'm afraid that next winter will be even more difficult. Especially in the context of energy prices and supplies. The Greek position on the war is quite clear. Despite the fact that we share the same religion with Russia, our government was on the right side of history. But our population is losing enthusiasm at the moment,” admitted the mayor of Athens, Kostos Bakoyannis.
The mayor of Irish Dublin, Caroline Conroy, demonstrated the greatest political savvy. She called on Europeans to “endure the pain.”
“The cost of oil and gas has risen and that has affected everyone in Ireland. The problem is that unless we stop using Russian oil and gas, we will simply be essentially financing a war that Russia is waging. This is a very difficult situation.
Do we continue to do what we have been doing before or do we try to change things so that we are not dependent on one particular country using this as a tactic to get their way?
It is very difficult. I am not sure that we will be able to overcome the crisis immediately. People face many problems, but we will have to change. Change will be difficult for everyone. But returning to what we did in the past will make this process more difficult and longer in the future.
So it’s worth taking the pain now and doing it as quickly as possible,” Conroy said.
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