View of Bulgaria's capital SofiaMOSCOW, 20 Mar. Bulgaria will not renew the contract with the Russian company «Gazprom» for the supply of natural gas. Such a statement, according to the Bulgarian National Radio, was made by Finance Minister Asen Vasilev. He explained that such a decision is connected with the situation in Ukraine. Bulgaria, according to Vasilev, will receive gas from alternative suppliers, including Qatar and Algeria. The government also plans to use the existing infrastructure of Greece and Turkey to purchase liquefied natural gas and increase imports from Azerbaijan, which already exports raw materials to Bulgaria. Earlier, the former head of the European Commission, former Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi said that Europe would not be able to replace Russia in the short term. as a supplier of natural gas. He stressed that the EU sanctions imposed against Russia in connection with the situation in Ukraine have not yet provided for the cessation of energy supplies. could easily abandon Russian oil, Warsaw saidRussia launched a military operation in Ukraine on February 24. President Vladimir Putin called its goal «the protection of people who have been subjected to bullying and genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years.» For this, according to him, it is planned to carry out «demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine», to bring to justice all war criminals responsible for «bloody crimes against civilians» in Donbass. According to the Ministry of Defense, the Armed Forces strike only at military infrastructure and Ukrainian troops. With the support of the Russian military, the DPR and LPR groups are developing an offensive, but there is no talk of the occupation of Ukraine, the Russian president emphasized. companies announced their withdrawal from the Russian market.
