Robert Habeck, German Vice Chancellor, Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action stated that Germany’s dependence on Russian gas was “just absurd”. He said that now “under no circumstances” will Germany create “another unilateral dependence”.
Robert Habeck made this statement in his interview for Deutschlandfunk radio.
“Under no circumstances, we are going to create another unilateral dependence. Various suppliers should have a 10 or 20% share in the German energy supply system, not 50% or more as it was in the case with Russia. It was just absurd,” said the German Federal Minister for Economic Affairs.
Habeck shared his plans to visit Qatar and UAE to discuss energy supply issues and find ways to reduce the country’s dependence on Russia.
When asked if he is confident that the German gas storage facilities are going to be sufficiently full by the fall, Habeck replied: “Yes, but so far only with the Russian gas”.
“That’s the bitter truth that gets stuck in my throat. Do not think that this is my dream scenario, but that is how it is. Germany has no LNG terminal, so we rely on Dutch, Belgian, and French terminals,” explained the minister.
He added that so far without Russian supplies it would not be possible to guarantee that the German underground gas storage facilities are filled with gas.
“This is the damn moment when we cannot say that we are helping Ukraine refusing to cooperate with Russia immediately. However, you see that we are doing everything, literally everything to accelerate this process. Both with coal and with oil we are moving faster”, said the German Vice Chancellor.