MOSCOW, April 26. /TASS/. Gazprom does not confirm the information that the supply of Russian gas to Poland has already been stopped, the company’s spokesman Sergey Kupriyanov told reporters.

Gazprom stressed that "today Poland is obliged to pay for gas supplies in accordance with the new payment procedure."

Earlier, the Polish portal Onet reported, citing unofficial data in government circles and the energy company PGNiG, that Russia had suspended gas supplies to Poland under the Yamal contract. According to the portal, a crisis headquarters has been set up at the Ministry of Climate Affairs. Officially, the suspension of supplies is not reported, a notice of this should be received within a day.

According to the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Gas (ENTSOG), the physical flow of Russian gas through the Kondratki station stopped on the night of April 26. At the same time, a similar situation was observed on the night of April 24.

According to the Polish gas pipeline network operator Gaz-System, the flow of Russian gas through the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline on the border of Belarus and Poland through the Kondratki gas measuring station as of April 25 fell by 75% compared to April 21.

Russia supplies gas to Poland under the 1996 Yamal contract. It provides for the supply of about 10 billion cubic meters of gas per year, the minimum annual contract amount is 8.7 billion cubic meters per year. In 2021, according to the Russian Federal Customs Service, Russian gas supplies to Poland increased by 9.4% to 10.58 billion cubic meters.

The agreement expires at the end of 2022, and the Polish authorities announced several years ago that the country would not renew it. Annually Poland uses about 20 billion cubic meters of gas. Warsaw says it has found a way to phase out Russian gas by buying liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the United States and Qatar, as well as supplying gas from Norway.

On March 31, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree that lays out a new procedure for paying for gas supplies by buyers from unfriendly countries. Now such states must transfer funds in foreign currencies to Gazprombank, which will buy rubles on exchanges and transfer them to special ruble accounts of importers. Poland is on the list of unfriendly countries.