Courts Unfreeze Gazprom Assets

Russia’s Gazprom confirmed late on January 20 that a freeze on its assets in England, Wales, the Netherlands and Luxembourg had been lifted, at the request of Ukraine’s Naftogaz.

Naftogaz began seeking the arrest of Gazprom’s foreign assets in 2018 to put pressure on the company to pay a Stockholm arbitration award. However, Gazprom eventually paid $2.92bn to Naftogaz to settle the award at the end of last year, as part of a broader set of agreements between the pair that paved the way for Russian gas transit to continue through Ukraine from 2020 onwards.

In exchange, Ukraine agreed to sign a legal settlement and withdraw all outstanding claims. Gazprom confirmed the assets had been unfrozen by courts in a statement on a Russian corporate disclosure portal. The assets included Gazprom subsidiaries that operate the Blue Stream and TurkStream (formerly South Stream) gas pipelines that run under the Black Sea.