GGP: The EU Competition Investigation into Gazprom’s Sales to Central and Eastern Europe: a comment on commitments
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This is an excerpt from a paper by the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies published in April 2017.
On 4 September 2012 the Competition Directorate (DG COMP) of the European Commission (EC), having carried out unannounced inspections (‘dawn raids’) at the premises of several companies in ten EU Member States one year earlier, opened formal proceedings against Gazprom for possible abuse of a dominant position under Art. 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) in upstream gas supply markets in several central and eastern European member states. It stated that Gazprom may have (a) divided gas markets by hindering the free flow of gas across member states; (b) prevented the diversification of supply of gas; (c) imposed unfair prices on its customers by linking the price of gas to oil prices.1
The Russian government, considering the investigation to be both politically and commercially motivated, adopted an executive order forbidding Gazprom to provide information on its activities upon request from non-Russian authorities, other than under the government’s prior consent. 2 The allencompassing nature and the swiftness with which the order (which should be seen as a form of insurance safeguarding the interests of the Russian state) was adopted suggested that the government did not rule out any – including the worst-case – scenario relating to the treatment of Gazprom’s case by the EC.
The statements, opinions and data contained in the content published in Global Gas Perspectives are solely those of the individual authors and contributors and not of the publisher and the editor(s) of Natural Gas World.