WASHINGTON, January 25. /TASS/. It will take up to two weeks to organize extra gas deliveries to Europe in case of escalation of the situation around Ukraine, a high-ranking official of the US Administration said at a special briefing for reporters on Tuesday.

"We will be able to have the suppliers standing ready to increase their supply into Europe. And then that would take obviously a number of days to a week or two to reroute those supplies. So knowing that there is still natural gas in storage in Europe, but just not enough, we will be able to draw on storage for the first couple of weeks as the supplies come in and supply the rest," the official said.

"That is the contingency effort that we're putting now to cut down that effort from months to just days and weeks. And to be able to have a seamless continuation of winter supplies and into the spring," he added.