EU member to struggle in opposition to Russian gasoline ban
Slovakia is set to launch legal action against the European Union over its decision to ban Russian gas imports, Prime Minister Robert Fico announced on Tuesday, according to news website Dennik N.
The EU’s move, which received final approval from member states on Monday, aims to halt Russian gas imports by late 2027, making their vow to cut ties with their former top supplier legally binding, nearly four years after Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Both Slovakia and Hungary voted against the measure. Hungary said it would challenge the law at the European Court of Justice.
The ban was designed to be approved by a reinforced majority of countries, allowing it to overcome opposition from Hungary and Slovakia, who remain heavily reliant on Russian energy imports and want to maintain close ties with Moscow.
Under the agreement, the EU will halt Russian liquefied natural gas imports by end-2026 and pipeline gas by 30 September, 2027.
The law allows that deadline to shift to 1 November, 2027, at the latest, if a country is struggling to fill its storage caverns with non-Russian gas ahead of winter.
Russia supplied more than 40 per cent of the EU’s gas before 2022. That share dropped to around 13 per cent in 2025, according to the latest available EU data.
But some EU countries continue to pay Moscow for oil, pipeline gas and liquefied natural gas, contradicting their efforts to support Ukraine and restrict funding to Russia’s wartime economy.
Last month, the five biggest EU importers spent €1.4 billion ($1.66 billion) on Russian energy, mostly on gas and LNG, data from the non-profit Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air showed. Hungary was the biggest buyer, before France and Belgium.
The EU imposed sanctions on Russian seaborne oil in 2022, but never proposed sanctions on gas imports, which would require unanimous approval from all 27 EU countries.
The EU law prohibits companies from signing new Russian gas deals and will require those with existing contracts to terminate them to comply with the ban.
For existing contracts, imports under short-term deals signed before 17 June 2025, will be banned on 25 April 2026, for LNG, and 17 June for pipeline gas. Long-term contracts must be phased out by the final deadlines.
Companies could face financial penalties of up to 3.5 per cent of total global annual turnover for failure to comply.
The European Commission plans to also propose legislation in the coming months to phase out Russian pipeline oil, and wean countries off Russian nuclear fuel.
Source: independent.co.uk
