Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that the conditions for a ceasefire in Ukraine “are not yet ripe,” Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi told a news conference on Thursday.
During their telephone conversation, Putin also told the Italian prime minister that a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky “It’s premature.”
Referring to a telephone conversation he had with the Kremlin leader the previous day, Mario Draghi said Putin also told him that the current gas contracts were still in force, and that European companies would continue to pay. in euros and dollars.
“What I understood, but I may be wrong, is that the conversion of the payment is an internal matter of the Russian Federation,” said Draghi.
Possibly during the day will give the Kremlin its proposal for gas payments in rubles, which will apply to Germany and all “unfriendly” countries. One version seems to envisage an intermediary role of Gazprom Bank, which will accept payments in euros or dollars and convert this money into rubles internally, in Russia, as stated by the Italian Prime Minister.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly said in recent days that “unfriendly” countries to Russia should pay for gas in rubles, instead of dollars or euros. However, Moscow backed away from demanding that payments in rubles be made from today, removing even for the time being the risk of a serious disruption of supplies in Europe.
It is recalled that Putin had asked the state gas company Gazprom, the central bank and the government to give instructions for the implementation of the new policy from today, Thursday. The big economies of the G7 rejected Russia’s demandfor currency change.
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