© Getty Images / Peter Dazeley
Russia's demand for ruble payments for natural gas cannot be fulfilled, according to Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio, who says doing so would breach EU sanctions.
"We cannot pay in rubles; Russia introduced a double billing scheme from euro to rubles, this is impossible as it would mean bypassing sanctions against the [Russian] Central Bank," Di Maio said in an interview with Italy's Radio 24.
According to him, Russia has imposed an embargo against itself "from a technical point of view."
Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio
"I am convinced that Italy should not tolerate any form of blackmail. We need to diversify the supplies, we haven't done it yet, but we have to," he said.
In March, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that the "hostile countries" which imposed sanctions on Moscow must now pay for Russian natural gas in rubles only.
The demand received a negative response from most of the EU. However, some nations, including Hungary and Slovakia, said they were willing to accept this method of settlement. The Kremlin also indicated that in the future, all Russian commodities will have to be paid for in rubles.
Comment: Brave words. How will they hold up when winter arrives, and the all the European countries' scramble to secure supplies prove inadequate? It's a seller's market after all. Putin has kindly given Europe the entire summer to contemplate their situation.
These charts are eight and six years old respectively. There have been very few significant new discoveries since then, and the ability to exploit them is a long-term affair.
They tell a clear enough story. Italy is dreaming if it thinks Algeria, or the Congo (which didn't even make the list), will be able to replace its percentage of Russian gas.