In March 2014, the Russian parliament passed an agreement signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Chairman of the Crimean Parliament.
In this agreement, Crimea successfully formally joined Russia as a "federal subject".
As soon as the news spread, there was an uproar in Ukraine!
Since then, the Ukrainian authorities have taken many initiatives aimed at confronting Russia.
Among them, the refusal to buy Russian gas is an important economic measure.
In November 2015, the Ukrainian side made a decision, claiming that Ukraine would later buy the gas it needed from European countries and would no longer buy Russian gas.
In addition, the leaders of the Ukrainian authorities have declared that the natural gas provided by Europe will be cheaper than the price of natural gas in Russia.
However, the subsequent investigation of the investigation hit the Ukrainian authorities hard, because most of the so-called "European" gas purchased by Ukraine is natural gas from Russia, and the price is much higher than that of directly buying Russian gas!
The incident was publicly exposed in front of the media by Tymoshenko, a former Ukrainian prime minister and longtime opposition representative. With the facts she investigated, she spared no room in exposing them in front of the media:
Most of the so-called "European" gas that Kiev buys from Western countries actually comes from Russia!
Tymoshenko angrily accused the Ukrainian authorities of concealment, calling it a cruel deception of the Ukrainian people!
From Tymoshenko's original words, it can be seen that the natural gas purchased by Ukraine since 2014 has always been Russian, not European at all.
The so-called "European" gas in Kiev's mouth is nothing more than Russian gas bought by Ukraine from European middlemen.
As soon as this statement came out, the entire Ukrainian people knew that this was a hoax!
So why is the source of "European" gas that Ukraine bought at a high price from Russia? Who, exactly, deceived Ukraine?
First, the natural gas scam in Europe
In addition, Tymoshenko said that the price of Russian gas that has been sold will become more expensive.
This is because the European middlemen have collected a large amount of rebates as profits, resulting in higher transportation costs of natural gas, and the selling price has to follow suit!
(Putin)
And "Russian gas" turned into "European gas", and it only needed to go through a fictitious gas ring pipeline!
It's ridiculous!
But Ukrainian President Zelenskiy has not responded to this.
Even if this matter spread throughout Ukraine, then to Europe, and even to the whole world, he did not stand up and explain, perhaps he was not afraid of being seen as a joke by the people of the world as a comedian at all?
In fact, this oolong incident is not surprising, because Europe simply does not have the ability to provide enough natural gas to Ukraine! This is evidenced by the fact that Europe itself has to rely on the import of large quantities of natural gas from Russia to survive the winter!
in Zelenskiy
All along, Europe's dependence on Russian natural gas is relatively deep, just as the so-called "mud bodhisattva crossing the river, it is difficult to protect itself", how can Europe, which itself is short of natural gas, have the ability to meet ukraine's natural gas demand?
As Tymoshenko said, Kiev's purchase of "European" gas has always been a hoax!
After the truth was revealed, public opinion continued to ferment, and finally, under pressure, the Ukrainian authorities decided to resume the policy of buying natural gas from Russia.
This decision was undoubtedly wise, because without the squeeze of middlemen, the price of buying natural gas in Ukraine was much cheaper.
At this point, this farce about natural gas is basically over.
As a result, the Ukrainian government has had to compromise with Russia and may lose face.
But for ordinary people in Ukraine, it is a great thing that does not have to spend money!
(Crimea joins Russia's signing of the agreement)
Why does natural gas come from Russia?
This has to say about the gas situation in Russia.
According to statistics, russia's total natural gas is still ranked first in the world, and the annual export volume of natural gas is second to none in the world.
On the contrary, although Ukraine is close to Russia, it does not have rich natural gas resources and relies on natural gas delivered from Russia for production and life every year.
Europe and Ukraine are in a similar situation, and natural gas and energy are also in short supply, so it is natural that Russia has become the largest supplier of natural gas in Europe.
However, Russian natural gas cannot be transported directly to Europe, and must first pass through Ukraine in the process, so Ukraine naturally takes over this oil difference.
According to relevant data, half of the natural gas that Russia transports to Europe through Ukraine remains in Ukraine for the use of the Ukrainian people, and Ukraine can also charge Russia up to a billion dollars a year for natural gas transit fees.
(Natural Gas Pipeline)
However, what makes Russia unbearable is that Ukraine has obviously taken advantage of everything, and it still wants lions to open their mouths and constantly demand that the transit cost of natural gas be raised!
This makes Russia very disgusted! Therefore, the contradictions between the two sides continue to accumulate and gradually develop to the point of being on the verge of erupting!
Finally, when it came to the issue of Crimean sovereignty, the contradictions that had accumulated between the two sides for a long time were completely intensified at once!
Second, Russia complains with Germany and continues to cooperate with Ukraine
So, has Russia chosen to punish Ukraine for its former "rebellion"?
The answer, of course, is no!
Zelenskiy
Not only that, but Russia has chosen to continue to cooperate with Ukraine as before.
At the end of 2019, Russia and Ukraine re-signed an agreement on natural gas transmission projects.
One of them is that the Ukrainian side requires Gazprom to transport at least 40 billion cubic meters of natural gas to Europe through Ukraine every year, and the validity period of this requirement is four years.
Russia not only agreed to this, but also did it without any mistakes!
At this point, one wonders whether Russia is doing this because Ukraine is already important enough to be responsive.
(Ukrainian location)
This is a difficult question to answer, because Ukraine is indeed important to Russia in terms of strategic geography, but not necessarily in terms of gas transmission alone.
Because Ukraine will not always be the only channel for Russia to transport gas to Europe, in the near future, another pipeline project for gas transmission, Nord Stream-2, may be officially launched at any time!
The Nord Stream-2 gas pipeline project is a major cooperation project between Russia and Europe, with the aim of transporting Russian natural gas directly to Europe.
For this project, European countries such as Germany are very supportive, and even though they have been sanctioned by the United States many times during the period, they have been trying to maintain the construction progress and refuse to give up easily.
By September 2021, the Nord Stream-2 project had completed the laying of all natural gas pipelines.
("Nord Stream-2" route)
Later, from the relevant reports of the German media, it can be seen that the company responsible for operating the "Nord Stream-2" natural gas pipeline project has filled the second natural gas transmission pipeline of the project with natural gas.
By the end of January 2022, the "Nord Stream-2" project had been officially registered in Germany and the relevant operating company had been established!
At present, due to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and the sanctions taken by the United States and other countries on the project project, the "Nord Stream-2" project has been temporarily stopped.
But the company in charge of the project has not announced that it will end or abandon the project, and has not declared bankruptcy even in the case of payment difficulties, so it is still very likely that the construction will be completed and put into use.
At that time, Ukraine will no longer be the only necessary area for Russian gas to be transported to Europe, which means that Ukraine is likely to lose the important revenue of gas transit fees at any time!
(Natural Gas Pipeline)
Earning less money is not a small loss for Ukraine, because Ukraine's financial and economic situation has become unoptimistic because of the protracted civil war, and without this money, the financial pressure may increase significantly!
Moreover, when Russia no longer needs to pass through Ukraine to deliver natural gas to Europe, will it still sell gas to Ukraine at a preferential price much lower than the original selling price, as before?
If the answer is no, then it is bound to be worse for Ukraine!
But all this has no effect on Russia, because Russia has always been a seller, and it is his freedom to sell how it wants and to whom it wants to sell.
There is no winner in any war
Today, the contradictions between Russia and Ukraine have evolved into tense military conflicts, and relations have become unprecedentedly tense.
(Chechen army under Russian command)
It should be not only known that this war will not only have a serious impact on the lives of the two peoples, especially the Ukrainian people, but also greatly affect the supply of natural gas in Russia.
Russia did not stop sending gas to Europe because of the war, but as in the past, it normally delivered enough gas to Europe through Ukraine.
But one thing is foreseeable, that is, if the war continues for a long time, sooner or later there will be problems in the supply of Russian gas.
At that time, Russia will undoubtedly suffer economic interests, but Ukraine will not be spared.
So there is no doubt that this war must not bring benefits to Ukraine, at least not to the Ukrainian people.
It is conceivable that once there is a problem with Russia's natural gas supply, it will lead to more shortages of natural gas in many countries, especially those European countries that are very dependent on Russian gas, I am afraid that there will be heating difficulties in the winter!
And Ukraine will definitely be one of them!
At that time, the Ukrainian people who do not have natural gas to use will surely suffer a lot, and then the Ukrainian government must pay for this bad situation!
As the so-called "water can carry boats, but also can overturn boats", whether it is refusing to use Russian gas or going to war with Russia, the Ukrainian government will eventually do its own thing!
(Russian submarine)
On the contrary, if Ukraine maintains good relations with Russia, or does not have a conflict with Russia, then Ukraine may be able to enjoy the low-cost natural gas provided by Russia for a longer period of time, and may even continue to receive the enviable gas transit fee from it!
And Russia will certainly not treat Ukraine lightly, because Ukraine's strategic geographical location determines how Russia treats it!
Finally, it is hoped that the war will end sooner rather than later, because only from Russia's incalculable military strength, ukraine will have to pay a terrible price for it, no matter what the end of the war is declared!
I also hope that Ukraine will recognize the reality sooner, as the Ukrainian opposition party said when it first refused to buy Russian gas: Ukraine's refusal to use Russian gas is a fantasy!
Resources:
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