A team of UK government ministers led by Foreign Secretary William Hague have today submitted papers to the EU Parliament asking member states to reduce their reliance on Russian energy. While this seems like a feeble attempt to threaten the former soviet government with old and gas sanctions should their operations continue in the Ukraine, Vladimir Putin responded with laughter in a recent television interview. When asked by the show’s presenter that he thought of the UK governments requests he said:
“I expect nothing less from the British ruling party. They spend their entire budget traveling around the world empire building, yet when we intervene in a former soviet country to stop a civil war, suddenly we’re the bad guys. Just look at what’s happened in Iraq and Afghanistan over the last fifteen years. Western military forces have literally ripped the Middle East apart in their pursuit of oil and riches, yet where are the letters requesting we reduce our reliance on their energy supply? William Hague is a corrupt man, for whom I have no time at all.”
While Putin seems unphased by the move British politicians are making in Europe at the moment, those working for Russian international energy companies are less than confident with the occurrences. We managed to get in touch with a gentleman who heads up one of these firms, and he told us:
“I do not take the same relaxed approach as our president Mr Putin when it comes to the plans British lawmakers are attempting to force on the EU. At the current time, more than 35% of our total turnover comes from outside the Russian state. This means any sanctions on the sale of oil and gas in Europe could put us out of business almost immediately. Even the energy we supply to south America is sold through the EU first.”
So, what would happen if the EU parliament made it illegal to deal in Russian Energy in the current climate?
Well, that’s not completely clear. The economy is in no danger of collapse, but any sanctions could have drastic consequences for seismic consultancies like the Russian equivalent of our own EPI Group. Alongside this, Russia currently provides millions in aid to countries like Romania, Syria and Palestine, and some worry this could be cut.
All this has come about thanks to the trouble currently unfolding in Ukraine and particularly the Crimea area. While we don’t see any problem with Russia intervening in a country so intertwined with their own, the British Government seem overly concerned, which suggests perhaps they may have played some part in aucustrating the entire situation from the very beginning.
Why MP’s and parliamentary aides want to re-start the cold war is far beyond the majority of the UK public, and there is certainly a lot of resistance to any measures placed against Russia at the current time.
Will the UK people rise up and stop their leaders before it’s too late? We simply don’t know, but one thing is for certain; Russia are more than capable of looking after themselves, so picking a fight with Putin and his boys definitely isn’t a good idea.
Let us know your opinion on the matter.
