EU blasts Russia for weaponising gas in Moldova

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The European Union’s foreign policy chief has accused Russia of weaponising gas against Moldova.

Russia is using “gas as a weapon” in waging a “hybrid war” against the small southeast European country, Kaja Kallas said late on Tuesday, pledging the bloc’s support. Moldova’s breakaway region of Transnistria, which enjoys strong links with Moscow, has been without gas since the beginning of the year amid a financial spat between Chisinau and Russia’s state-owned gas giant Gazprom.

“Russia continues to use gas as a weapon and once again Moldova is a target of its hybrid warfare,” Kallas wrote overnight on social media platform X. “Thanks to EU support Moldova remains resilient and well-connected to European energy networks.”

For decades, Transnistria, a mainly Russian-speaking breakaway region along the Ukrainian border, had been receiving Russian gas via Ukraine.

But that route was cut off on New Year’s Day after Kyiv refused to extend a transit deal with Moscow that had persisted through nearly three years of war between the pair.