ZAPOROZHYE, Ukraine (AP) – Ukraine halted the flow of Russian natural gas Wednesday through a hub that feeds European homes and stoves, while the Kyiv military says it has made some progress in heavy fighting near a key northeastern city.
For 11 weeks, the war took place on the battlefields of Ukrainian cities and towns, but also on energy and financial markets, as Ukraine’s allies in the West sought to deprive Russia of the money needed to finance the war with sanctions and energy embargoes.
The practical impact of Wednesday’s gas cut-off on European households was not immediately clear: Ukraine’s pipeline operator said it would shift supplies to another hub, and an analyst said transit should not be affected.
But Russian state-owned giant Gazprom said there was a decline: it said it was sending 72 million cubic meters of gas to Europe via Ukraine, apparently 25 percent less than the day before.
Preliminary flow data suggest higher speeds passing through a second station in Ukrainian-controlled territory. Russian gas also passes to Europe via other pipelines.
It was also unclear whether Russia would suffer an immediate blow, as there are long-term contracts and other ways to transport gas.
But this move may have symbolic significance, as for the first time Ukraine has disrupted the flow to the west. This comes as the European Union seeks to reduce its dependence on Russian energy by gradually ending the use of coal and considering doing the same with oil. Gas is a more complex problem, given both the amount used by Europe and the technical difficulties of obtaining it elsewhere.
On the battlefield, President Vladimir Zelensky said the Ukrainian military had pushed Russian forces out of four villages near Kharkiv, the country’s second-largest city and key to Russia’s offensive in eastern Donbass.
After his forces failed to capture the capital in the early days of the war, Russian President Vladimir Putin turned his attention to the region, which is Ukraine’s industrial heartland and also a battleground between Moscow-backed separatists and Ukrainian troops for years.
Zelensky suggested that the military was gradually pushing Russian troops out of Kharkov. As his forces appear to be gaining momentum in a nascent counter-offensive, Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba voiced what appears to boost confidence – and broaden goals – on Tuesday. He suggested to the Financial Times that Ukraine could go beyond simply forcing Russia back into areas it held before the invasion began 11 weeks ago.
Kuleba’s statement seems to reflect more political ambitions than the realities of the battlefield: Russian forces have made progress in and controlled more of Donbass than before the war. But this underscores how Ukraine has stopped a larger, better-armed Russian army, surprising many who expected a much faster end to the conflict.
Meanwhile, the British Ministry of Defense said Ukraine was targeting Russian forces on Snake Island in the northwestern Black Sea in an attempt to thwart Moscow’s attempts to expand its influence.
Russia has tried to strengthen its garrison on Snake Island while “Ukraine successfully strikes on Russia’s air defenses and supplies ships with Bayraktar drones,” the ministry said on Twitter. It says Russian supply ships had minimal protection after the Russian fleet withdrew to Crimea after losing the flagship of its Black Sea Fleet.
Satellite images analyzed by the Associated Press show fighting there.
But the statement warned: “If Russia consolidates its position on (Snake Island) with strategic air defenses and cruise missiles for coastal defense, they could dominate the northwestern Black Sea.
The Ukrainian natural gas pipeline operator has said it will cut off Russian supplies through a hub in part of eastern Ukraine controlled by Moscow-backed separatists due to interference by “occupying forces”, including the apparent gas suction. He also complained of disruptions to the route last month.
European benchmark gas futures shook on Tuesday and Wednesday in the news, meaning consumers may face higher energy bills – at a time of rising prices.
Higher prices would benefit Russia, although it has huge foreign reserves now given the rapid rise in crude oil prices in recent months as global travel and business resumed following massive blockades by a coronavirus pandemic.
The hub in question processes about a third of Russia’s gas passing through Ukraine to Western Europe. Russia’s state-owned natural gas giant Gazprom has set the figure at about a quarter.
The move came as Western powers sought to increase economic pressure on Moscow and support Ukraine’s defenders. The US House of Representatives approved a $ 40 billion aid package for Ukraine on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, Ukrainian authorities said a Russian missile attack was aimed at the area around Zaporozhye, destroying unspecified infrastructure. There are no immediate reports of casualties. The southeastern city was a refuge for many civilians fleeing the Russian siege of the devastated port city of Mariupol.
With much of the fighting centered in the east, some analysts have suggested that Russia may be trying to expand Kyiv’s forces by striking at the southern port of Odessa, a major grain gate that feeds the world, and a key transit point for western weapons. Russia fired several missiles at the city this week, Ukrainians said on Tuesday.
To protect Odessa, Kyiv may need to move its forces to the southwest, diverting them from the eastern front to Donbass, where they are fighting near Kharkiv to push the Russians back across the border.
Russian planes twice fired unguided missiles on Tuesday in the Sumy region northeast of Kharkiv, according to Ukraine’s border service. The governor of the region said the rockets hit several apartment buildings, but no one was killed. Russian mortars hit the Chernihiv region, along the Ukrainian border with Belarus, but there are no reports of casualties.
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Gambrell reported from Lviv, Ukraine. Jessica Fish in Bakhmut, David Keaton in Kyiv, Juras Karmanau in Lviv, Mstislav Chernov in Kharkiv, Lolita S. Baldor in Washington, Kelvin Chan in London and AP staff around the world.
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