{"id":415524,"date":"2025-01-03T13:44:35","date_gmt":"2025-01-03T12:44:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2025\/01\/03\/fico-slovacchia-sussidi-profughi-ucraini\/"},"modified":"2025-01-03T18:13:08","modified_gmt":"2025-01-03T17:13:08","slug":"slovak-government-threatens-retaliation-against-ukrainian-decision-to-halt-russian-gas-transit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2025\/01\/03\/slovak-government-threatens-retaliation-against-ukrainian-decision-to-halt-russian-gas-transit\/","title":{"rendered":"Slovak government threatens retaliation against Ukrainian decision to halt Russian gas transit"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brussels – The tug-of-war between Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico<\/strong> and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky<\/strong> does not appear to be near an\u00a0end. Following\u00a0the widely announced\u00a0decision by Kyiv<\/strong>\u00a0to hal<\/strong>t the transit of Russian gas<\/strong> through its territory, the Slovak premier\u00a0is reportedly considering retaliatory measures<\/strong> that would affect both\u00a0the attacked country an\u00a0Ukrainian refugees residing in Slovakia.<\/p>\n

In a video\u00a0posted on Facebook<\/a>, Slovak prime minister\u00a0Robert Fico<\/strong>\u00a0said his cabinet has begun discussions on\u00a0potential retaliatory measures against Kyiv<\/strong> in response to the decision<\/a> of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky<\/strong> to halt\u00a0the transit of gas<\/strong> from the Russian Federation through the former Soviet republic to Austria<\/strong>, Czechia<\/strong>, Slovakia,<\/strong> and Hungary<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"Gazprom\"<\/a>
Archived photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Zelensky hailed the end of Russian\u00a0gas\u00a0transit as “one of Moscow’s greatest defeats<\/strong>.” For Fico, however, the Ukrainian move will lead to “sabotaging Slovakia’s public finances<\/strong> and harming the financial interests of the entire EU.” “Slovakia must demonstrate that it is a sovereign country,<\/strong>” he added,\u00a0which could mean, <\/a>out of spite,\u00a0challenging the subsidies<\/strong> guaranteed so far\u00a0to<\/strong> Ukrainian refugees on national soil.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The actions Fico is reportedly\u00a0considering could involve cutting financial support to more than 130,000 refugees<\/strong> residing in Slovakia (which borders the former Soviet republic) as well as suspension of electricity supplies to Ukraine<\/strong>, whose energy infrastructure is constantly bombed<\/strong> by Russian drones and missiles. Bratislava could also demand compensation<\/strong> from\u00a0Kyiv for the losses<\/strong> that Fico says the country will suffer due to the shutdown<\/strong>\u00a0of the Russian-Ukrainian gas pipeline<\/strong>\u00a0in the absence of renewed contracts with Gazprom for Russian natural gas transit.<\/p>\n

Zelensky decided well before the end of last year to let the five-year contract<\/strong> with the Russian state gas giant expire without renewing it in early 2025. Fico had repeatedly challenged this choice<\/strong>, attempting to persuade Kyiv to take a step back\u00a0because, he argued, the termination would hurt the EU more than Russia,<\/strong> leading to a spike in\u00a0gas prices<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"Volodymyr<\/a>
Ukranian president Volodymyr Zelensky (photo: Attila Kisbenedek\/Afp)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

However, Zelensky rejected the offer<\/a> and pressed ahead, stressing that he did not intend to allow the Kremlin to “make more billions on our blood.”<\/strong>\u00a0So the Slovak premier traveled to the Kremlin<\/strong> on Dec. 22<\/a>\u00a0to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin<\/strong>\u00a0and ask him\u00a0not to turn off\u00a0gas supplies,<\/strong>\u00a0proposing to be the mediator<\/a> in peace negotiations with Kyiv<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Bratislava will not suffer gas shortages but will lose about 500 million<\/strong> euros a year in fees related to transit fees through Slovakia<\/strong> to other EU countries, Fico assured. There are already substitute agreements<\/strong> for supplies from Moscow (6.5 billion cubic meters in 2023), which are in addition to the gas that continues to arrive from pipelines in Austria, Czechia, and Hungary: a short-term pilot agreement<\/strong> with Azerbaijan<\/strong> and another for the import of US-based LNG\u00a0via Poland<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

According to\u00a0European Association of Gas Infrastructure Operators (GIE)\u00a0data<\/a>, \u00a0storage in Bratislava is\u00a075.17 percent<\/strong> full–that is, more than the EU average of just under 72 percent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Following Kyiv’s decision not to renew its contracts with Gazprom, which expired at the end of 2024, Bratislava could announce retaliatory measures. Possible halt to electricity supply to the former Soviet republic and the suspension of subsidies to Ukrainian refugees in Slovakia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7876,"featured_media":415514,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25707],"tags":[26042,26458,26206,25866,27047,30115,27914,26359,28987,27555,26360],"class_list":["post-415524","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-politics","tag-applicants-asylum-en","tag-energy-en","tag-eu-en","tag-ongazprom","tag-refugees-en-2","tag-robert-fico-en","tag-war-di-russia-in-ukraine-en","tag-gas-russo-en","tag-slovakia-and"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415524","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7876"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=415524"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415524\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":415557,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415524\/revisions\/415557"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/415514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=415524"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=415524"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=415524"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}