The European Union commissioner for competition, Margrethe Vestager, said that energy "should flow freely within Europe, regardless of where it comes from. We have opened an investigation to look at whether there are problematic territorial restriction clauses in gas supply contracts with Qatar Petroleum. Such clauses may harm competition and prevent consumers from enjoying the benefits of an integrated European energy market."  

Qatar Petroleum is the largest exporter of LNG globally and to Europe, controlling several companies that produce and export LNG to Europe. The EC will further investigate whether Qatar Petroleum's long-term agreements, typically 20 or 25 years, for the supply of LNG into the EEA contain direct or indirect territorial restrictions.

In particular, certain clauses contained in these agreements appear to, directly or indirectly, restrict the EEA importers' freedom to sell the LNG in alternative destinations within the EEA. For example, some contractual clauses prevent any diversion of cargoes to another destination or restrict the territories to which diversion can take place or the volumes that can be diverted. As a result, these clauses may unduly limit the free flow of LNG sold by Qatar Petroleum in the EEA, segmenting the EU's internal gas market.

If proven, such practices may breach EU antitrust rules, specifically on anti-competitive agreements between companies and the abuse of a dominant market position.

The EC said it will carry out its in-depth investigation as a matter of priority, but that opening a formal investigation does not prejudge its outcome. 

The bans on redelivery of gas used to be a standard clause in gas exporters' contracts, meaning that one buyer's surplus gas could not compete with that exporter's gas in a neighbouring market. This was possible with pipeline gas to a limited extent, where a buyer could divert gas virtually to another buyer, further upstream, without the exporter being able to prove it was going on – until EC competition law allowed it to be done openly. 

The same thing happened with LNG: import terminal operators such as Fluxys in Belgium quickly responded to market demand for reloading facilities, so that tankers could extract Qatari LNG delivered to Zeebrugge and sell it in other parts of the world such as Japan, South Korea, or the Iberian peninsula where Qatar also sold gas, and where the oil-indexed price could be much higher than the original destination hub price.

Qatar Petroleum said in response that "it wishes to stress that it gives the highest importance to compliance with regulatory authorities in all geographical areas in which it operates. Qatar Petroleum looks forward to working with the European Commission to address any queries or concerns they may have in this regard.​"