Cracks in EU’s Energy Suicide: France & Belgium Refuse to Back Russian Gas Ban
6/4/25
France and Belgium - two top buyers of Russian LNG - are refusing to rubber-stamp the EU's proposed ban on Russian gas without serious answers about how it won’t wreck their economies even further.
The two countries are also worried about the legal consequences of the self-destructive plan to cut off cheap and reliable Russian gas by 2027.
France’s TotalEnergies is locked into a deal with Russia’s Novatek until 2032 and has a 20% stake in the Yamal LNG project.
Belgium is also set to continue receiving Russian LNG until 2035, and wants the EU Commission to show exactly what the impact would be, Belgian Energy Minister Mathieu Bihet told European media.
Hungary and Slovakia have been more emphatic. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban calls the plan a disaster that must be stopped "by all means.”
"This is an economic suicide: to come to the point where [there is] no gas, no oil, no nuclear fuel, nothing [from Russia] just because some new iron curtain is being set up between the Western world and perhaps Russia and other countries," Fico told a news conference last month.
Sky-high power bills, energy rationing, and deindustrialization are already hammering Europe thanks to Brussels’ sanctions spree.