1/10/25
Slovak PM Threatens to Block EU Aid to Ukraine Over Gas Transit Dispute
On January 1, Russian gas transit via Ukraine stopped, with the expiry of a 2019 contract between Russia's Gazprom and Ukraine's Naftogaz. The Russian company said it had neither the legal nor the technical capacity to continue pumping gas into the pipeline that supplied Moldova and four EU countries, namely Slovakia, Austria, Italy and the Czech Republic.
"If we are informed in three weeks that Ukraine is blocking everything [on the issue of gas transit], I will block financial assistance to Ukraine without any problems," Fico said during a meeting of the parliamentary committee on European Affairs.
Fico added that he is ready "to veto the decision of the European Union to send another 50 billion euros [$51.5 billion] to Ukraine."
Meanwhile, European Commission Spokesperson for Climate Action and Energy Anna-Kaisa Itkonen said that the Commission will form a technical group with Slovakia on energy after the suspension of Russian gas transit.
"The high level working group will be at technical level and our services in the commission, they are already working on the creation of this group. We are expecting this group to meet as soon as possible in the coming weeks. The group will include senior officials from the [EU] Commission and Slovakia," Itkonen told reporters, adding that Ukraine will not join the group.