BELARUS yesterday threatened to stop gas supplies from Russia reaching western Europe in an escalating diplomatic row between the two countries.
Gazprom, Russia's gas monopoly, has threatened to cut supplies to Belarus at 7am GMT today if no deal on prices is reached. Minsk said it would retaliate by halting flows of Russian gas crossing the country bound for western Europe. The row comes a year after a similar dispute when Ukraine disrupted Russian deliveries to Europe, undermining Russia's reliability as an energy supplier. Eighty per cent of Russian exports pass through Ukraine and the rest go via Belarus. |