Russian gas, the debate reignites after Salvini's words and Moscow's response

RUSSIAN GAS

We're back to talking about gas and Russia: the political debate has in fact been reignited on the words of Matteo Salvini, to which both the other deputy prime minister Antonio Tajani and the Russians themselves responded. But how much of Moscow's gas still reaches the European continent? This was also discussed in the episode of Numeri, the Sky TG24 program broadcast on 15 September 2026.

THE WORDS OF SALVINI

Matteo Salvini returned to the topic, as had already happened in the past. Quoted by the Tass agency, the Minister of Transport and Deputy Prime Minister, in a meeting with Italian entrepreneurs present in Russia, spoke of the possible return to the purchase of Russian gas: "When the conflict ends, absolutely yes; the numbers speak for themselves. Just look at the current costs, as well as those of two, three, four or five years ago".

TAJANI'S WORDS

"When the conflict ends, we all hope that normal relations will be able to be restored, even with the Russian Federation. I am increasingly in favor of the energy autonomy of our country, I am in favor of nuclear energy. The objective is to be increasingly autonomous", commented Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Antonio Tajani in response to the request to comment on Minister Salvini's statements.

THE RUSSIANS' RESPONSE

The news is that the Russians also responded. Moscow will be able to export gas to Western Europe again in the future "if these supplies are advantageous, first of all, and if it is possible to reserve the necessary volumes of gas, since many volumes have already been diverted to alternative destinations", declared Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

THE NOTICE

To date, any European country can still purchase gas from Russia. The tender, in fact, will start from 1 January 2027 for gas by ship and from 1 November 2027 for gas by pipe.

EUROPEAN MONEY

Is this being done so far? Yes again: as CREA data shows, in the last year on average one billion euros of European money ended up in Russian coffers.

WHO SPENDS THE MOST ON RUSSIAN GAS

It was not Italy that poured most of the European money into Moscow's coffers this year, but France, Spain and Belgium, which bought 2.30 respectively; 1.6 and 1.5 billion euros of Russian gas.

WHERE DOES ITALIAN GAS COME FROM

And in Italy instead? Our country is 96% dependent on imported gas, which comes in particular from countries such as Algeria (37%); USA (18%); Azerbaijan (16%); Norway (12%) and Qatar (9%). The remaining 4%, however, comes from Italy.