the city of The Hague, where the Dutch government and parliament sit, fails to terminate its contract with Moscow

“Nobody wants to deliver gas to The Hague“, headlines the Dutch press. This is one of the many consequences of the war in Ukraine: in the Netherlands, the city of The Hague, where the government and parliament sit, is preparing for a difficult and costly winter. contract that binds the municipality to the Russian supplier Gazprom.The town hall does not manage to get out of it while European rules oblige it to do so.

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On October 10, governments and administrations must end all public contracts that bind them to Russian companies, as required by the fifth set of European sanctions adopted in April 2022, which gave six months of delay to public bodies in the EU to put itself in order.

Gold, the third largest city in the Netherlands finds itself in a complex situation: the municipality claims that she had started looking for alternatives to Gazprom, even before the European sanctions, but her attempts were unsuccessful. It received no response to its invitation to tender published in June and July. The municipality has contacted other suppliers directly, but, according to it, it will be impossible to sign a new contract before the European deadline of October 10.

The Dutch administrative capital is therefore asking the government for an exemption to keep its contract with Gazprom until the end of the year. “Limited exemptions” are theoretically possible, according to the text of the European sanctions, if no “viable alternative” is found. But the town hall is already warning its constituents that the future contract risks being much more expensive. This thorny issue is only the first: 120 Batavian cities and towns also have contracts with Gazprom and the Dutch energy minister says he is not in favor of derogations.