Alexei Miller, chief of Russia's state-controlled Gazprom
gas giant, said that the company decreased supplies by 30 percent starting
Tuesday because Belarus has refused to pay the debt.
Gazprom initially reduced supplies by 15 percent Monday and
warned it would eventually cut deliveries by 85 percent if the debt was not
canceled.
Belarus, however, insists that Russia owes it $260 million
in transit fees. President Alexander Lukashenko said Tuesday in Minsk that he
had ordered to cut the supply of Russian gas to Europe because Russia had not
paid its bill.
In Moscow, Gazprom spokesman Sergey Kupriyanov told
reporters that Belarus' debt would increase Wednesday when the next month's
payment is due. He also said Gazprom would be willing to send observers to the
Belarusian-Russian border to monitor whether Belarus was illegally siphoning
off gas.
Spokeswoman Marlene Holzner said that the European
Commission, the EU's executive branch, expected that “the gas flows to the
European Union will not be affected.” Slightly more than 6 percent of total EU
gas consumption comes from gas shipped through Belarus.
In a letter to the European Commission late Monday, Belarus'
Energy Ministry warned that cuts of more than 15 percent could lead to transit
shortages.
Gazprom has promised that European customers wouldn't be
affected by the shut-off since Gazprom could reroute gas supplies through
another transit pipeline crossing Ukraine.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev rejected Belarus' proposal
to pay off the debt in goods, saying that Russia needed “no pies, no butter, no
cheese” — only cash.
Lukashenko on Tuesday described Medvedev's words as an
insult. “When they are trying to insult us with meat chops, sausage, butter or
pancakes — we consider it as an insult for the Belarusian people,” he said.
