The Greek government’s stance regarding Moscow’s demands for ruble-currency payments to Gazprom for natural gas supply will depend on decisions to be taken by fellow EU members, government officials have told energypress.

Athens is expected to push for greater clarity on the matter and a common European stance on the issue at an emergency meeting of EU energy ministers called by the French EU presidency for next Monday.

An imminent payment expected to be made by German company Uniper will be pivotal in decisions to be made by EU member states on Moscow’s ruble-currency payment demand for Russian gas supply.

According to German media, Uniper intends to make a euro-currency payment to Gazprom, but, rather than make the payment to a European bank, as the company has done until now, it will instead transfer the related amount to Russia’s Gazprombank, not on the sanctions list.

As has been widely reported, Russian president Vladimir Putin has ordered countries deemed as adversaries to make gas payments through a specific procedure involving two Gazprombank accounts, a foreign-currency account and a ruble-currency account. Gazprombank will convert foreign-currency sums to rubles before transferring the resulting amounts to parent company Gazprom.