France's energy minister, Agnès Pannier-Runacher, says that Russia is using gas as a weapon of war "as we anticipated" and is further reducing French supplies based on that supposition. But she says that France has been ready and preparing for such a scenario with the country already reducing its exposure to Russian gas imports to 9% - down from roughly double the amount before the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
The comments come after Gazprom said that it would fully suspend gas deliveries to French utility, Engie, starting from Thursday as they cite a dispute over payments. Nonetheless, the news isn't a welcome development for the energy outlook in Europe ahead of winter with the Nord Stream pipeline also already seeing gas supplies halted for the coming three days.
