SOFIA/WARSAW -Russian gas giant Gazprom (MCX 🙂 on Wednesday halted supply to Bulgaria, Poland and Romania for not paying for gas in roubles. The Kremlin’s harshest reaction to the West’s crippling sanctions for Ukraine’s invasion was to stop gas deliveries to these countries.

Bulgaria and Poland are among the countries that have had their gas shut off by Europe’s major supplier after the invasion of Ukraine on February 24, which left thousands homeless and raised the possibility of wider conflicts.

Gazprom announced in a statement, “Gazprom has suspended complete gas supplies to Bulgargaz and PGNiG (Bulgaria), due to the absence of payments for roubles.”

Gazprom further warned that gas illegally taken from Poland or Bulgaria would result in the suspension of transit via these countries.

Sofia and Warsaw stated that Gazprom had breached their contract, making them the largest company in the world.

After the West had frozen Russian assets and cut off Moscow from the West’s economy over the conflict in Ukraine, Vladimir Putin, the Russian president of Russia has instructed European nations to purchase gas in Russian roubles.

Putin requested that “unfriendly countries” accept a program that allowed them to open Gazprombank bank accounts, pay Russian gas imports in dollars and euros, then convert those into Russian roubles.

Gazprom stated that payments for gas supplies starting April 1 should be in rubles using new payment details. The counterparties have been informed promptly.

Poland repeatedly stated that it would not pay in Russian roubles for Russian gas and had planned to not extend its Gazprom gas contract after this year’s expiration.

While the Yamal Europe pipeline through Poland delivers Russian gas into Germany, most of its work has been in reverse this year. It supplies gas eastward from Germany. Bulgaria serves as a transit nation for supplies of gas to Serbian and Hungarian.

Alexander Nikolov, Bulgaria’s Energy Minister, stated that Russia has already paid April for Russian gas delivery and that stopping supplies of gas would violate Gazprom’s current contract.

Nikolov explained that the natural gas used to fuel the war is more political than economic.

On Wednesday, the benchmark Dutch front-monthly gas contract at TTF hub rose by over 19% to 117 Euros per Megawatt Hour.