Russia-Ukraine War 

Russia-Ukraine War

Russia-Ukraine War

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And why didn’t it cut off Russia’s natural gas earlier?

By Marc Santora, Andrew Higgins and Stanley Reed

Marc Santora reported from Kyiv, Ukraine; Andrew Higgins from Warsaw; and Stanley Reed from London

Natural fuel stopped flowing through a pipeline linking Russia and Ukraine on Wednesday, according to officials in both countries.

The effects of the halt, though long expected, could ripple through Europe’s energy sector and potentially affect Moscow’s ability to fund its war in Ukraine.

Ukraine has refused to renew an agreement that allows Russia to send vegetable fuel to Europe via pipeline. The agreement was revered even after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which triggered the bloodiest European confrontation since World War II.

The Urengoy-Pomary-Uzhgorod pipeline was built in the Soviet era to ship Siberian fuel to European markets. It has become the main crossing to the Ukrainian-Slovak border from Siberia, passing through the city of Sudzha, which is now under the control of Ukrainian army forces, in Russia’s Kursk region.

The pipeline was Russia’s last major gas corridor to Europe following the 2022 sabotage of the Nord Stream pipeline to Germany — probably by Ukraine — and the closure of a route through Belarus to Poland.

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