MOSCOW, February 28. /TASS/. Norway’s oil and gas firm Equinor (former Statoil) has decided to withdraw from joint ventures in Russia and stop new investments in the country, the company said in a statement on Monday.

"Equinor's Board of Directors has decided to stop new investments into Russia, and to start the process of exiting Equinor’s Russian Joint Ventures," the statement said. The decision has been made due to Russia’s military operation in Ukraine.

Equinor has had operations in Russia for more than 30 years. The Norwegian company owns 49% in the joint venture with Rosneft Krasgeonats, the same stake in the project with Rosneft on the exploration of the Domanic deposit reserves in the Samara Region, as well as 33.33% in the project on the development of the North Komsomolskoye field.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on February 24 that in response to a request by the heads of the Donbass republics he had made a decision to carry out a special military operation. The Russian leader stressed that Moscow had no plans of occupying Ukrainian territories. Western countries responded to the actions of the Russian authorities by slapping sanctions against physical and legal entities.