Mr Lukashenko, as president of a transit country, can issue an order to cut off our deliveries to Europe even though it will violate our transit contract, Vladimir Putin said in an interview with host of "Moscow. Kremlin. Putin" Pavel Zarubin.
"I hope it will not come to that. But on the other hand, sanctions are imposed on him and there is a threat of new sanctions. However, it would do more damage to Europe’s energy sector and would not contribute to the development of our relations with Belarus as a transit country,"he added.
The Russian President recalled that such a precedent has already taken place in recent history.
"In 2008, there was a crisis when we were unable to agree on the basic contract parameters among incessant arguments over the price of gas and transit. It came to the point that Ukraine blocked our gas bound for European consumers. They simply, as specialists say, turned off the tap and closed off the transit of Russian gas to Europe. This did happen," Putin noted.
"I spoke with Mr Lukashenko twice recently and he never told me about that, not even a hint. But he can probably do that. Although there is nothing good about it and I will certainly talk to him about this issue, unless he just said it in the heat of the moment,"he said.
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