The Lithuanian president said his country is ready to stop importing Russian oil and gas, in the latest sign some EU countries are planning to tighten penalties against Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine.
“It would create some problems, but those problems would not be critical,” President Gitanas Nauseda said of any decision to halt Russian supplies.
His warning comes as Russia continues to attack Ukraine.
The US has banned Russian oil imports.
Meanwhile, Britain said it would phase them out by the end of this year, and the EU aims to make Europe independent of Russian fossil fuels by 2030.
Regarding Lithuania, President Nauseda said: “Of course it depends on the time: how long we would have to adapt [to cutting Russian imports].
“But I would put it differently: we are better prepared for such a cut in Russian energy resources than many other countries in the EU.”
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Western countries sanctioned Moscow late last month over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the US banned imports of Russian energy, while Britain is phasing out Russian oil imports.
The EU, which gets about 40% of its gas from Russia, has announced plans to reduce dependency on this fuel source by two-thirds within a year.
The Lithuanian President’s warning shows how some countries are ready to put further pressure on Russia’s economy.
According to World Bank data, in 2019 Lithuania gets around 63% of its oil imports from Russia.
However, President Nauseda said that number is now lower because the country’s Mazeikiai oil refinery has decided not to buy crude oil from Russia.
On March 3, the refinery’s owner, Orlen Lietuva, announced that he had signed a contract with Saudi Aramco for five more tankers for the raw material extracted from the North Sea.
This would ensure an alternative supply for Lithuania, Poland and the Czech Republic.
Four days later, the company said it was “prepared for any scenario, including complete suspension of supplies from the eastbound direction,” given the situation in Ukraine.
Aside from oil, Lithuania has been working to reduce its dependence on Russia for natural gas over the past decade, including by opening its own LNG terminal called Independence.
However, independence from electricity is still a work in progress, President Nauseda said.
“We are still connected to the so-called Brell system of the former Soviet Union and this connection does not allow switching to others [European] systems [at present].
However, he said that the process of taking Lithuania away from Brell “will be completed in 2025”.
“Now we will try to speed up this process to disconnect faster,” he added.
President Nauseda also acknowledged ongoing concerns, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, over whether the Baltic states – including Lithuania – could be the next target for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“This is unfortunately true. When Putin declared that the greatest tragedy of the 20th century was the collapse of the Soviet Union, he had the Baltic countries in mind because they too are an integral part of the Soviet Union.
“So that’s a threat. We never had any illusions that we would be forgotten,” he said.
But he said the country has increased defense spending, including on military equipment. And he believes in the NATO military alliance.
“I really believe in NATO’s ability to function effectively as a collective defense organization,” he said. “I also see this lived solidarity with additional operational and military capacities on site.
“And for me that’s probably the best proof that NATO works,” he said.
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