Europe Gas Supply Issues Could Lead To Change in Governments

In light of the current crisis relative to gas supply in Europe, experts have predicted that such a situation could aggravate political tensions in the continent, which might also result in a change in the current governments.

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"If the economic situation worsens, if inflation rises, if Europe finds itself in a state of recession, then this may lead to a drop in the popularity of the current governments and, possibly, to their replacement. As a matter of fact, this process is already underway in Europe," said the head of the Russian International Affairs Council, Andrey Kortunov.

The Russian official highlighted the role played by Russia in trying to solve the gas supply problems to Europe, as seen in Moscow's attempt to launch the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. However, still, political difficulties seem to prevail over economic ones.

"Political obstacles turned out to be stronger than economic feasibility, so the issue is not being resolved. Apparently, the total volume of gas that Russia will supply to its customers in the EU will continue to be much less than expected," he said. According to the expert, Russian sanctions will not be eased to resolve the energy crisis.

Deputy General Director at the National Energy Security Fund, Aleksey Grivach, considers that European countries are already reducing gas consumption. "Prices still actually destroyed the economic cost and economic attractiveness of industrial production in the European Union, not to mention the production of electricity from gas. In fact, this works for their policy of reducing consumption. So they are ready to sacrifice consumers with their policy," he said.