German energy giant Uniper on Wednesday filed an arbitration case against Gazprom seeking compensation for cuts in Russian gas supplies to Germany via Nord Stream, which have cost it “11.6 billion euros” since June.
“Uniper has initiated an arbitration procedure against Gazprom”, before an international arbitration court located in Stockholm (Sweden), the German company has indicated, which demands “damages and losses in relation to the volumes not delivered since June”.
The costs generated by the cuts are estimated at “11,600 million euros” by the company, but they could “continue to increase until the end of 2024”.
Nord Stream closure
Uniper has been hit hard by the reduction since June, then the total end since September, of Russian gas deliveries to Germany, via the Nord Stream pipeline, against a backdrop of war in Ukraine.
The group was the main client of Russian Gazprom in the country.
To honor its contracts, it had to source gas on the spot market, where prices skyrocketed over the summer.
“We are seeking recovery of our significant financial damages… We have incurred these costs, but they are not our responsibility,” Klaus-Dieter Maubach, Uniper’s CEO, said in a statement.
Gazprom, for its part, invoked “force majeure” to stop its deliveries. A justification that Uniper refutes.
Sale of its Russian subsidiary
The company also announced on Wednesday that it had completed the sale of its Russian subsidiary Unipro, scheduled to start in the summer of 2021, to a “local buyer”, in order to “distance as much as possible” from its Russian activities.
Uniper, which supplied 40% of Germany’s gas supply, has suffered a record net loss of 40 billion since January due to this crisis.
To avoid contagion in the energy markets, the German government decided in September to nationalize the group, bailing it out through a rescue plan of several tens of billions of euros.
This plan must be officially adopted by the group’s general assembly, which must meet in extraordinary session on December 19.
Source: BFM TV
