Qatar’s Minister of State for Energy Affairs, Saad Sherida Al-Kaabi has said in an interview with CNN that the Gulf Corporation Country will continue to supply Europe with gas, despite Russia’s invasion of Ukraine raising worries of supply chain interruptions to that region.
“From a commercial standpoint, we don’t pick sides,” Al-Kaabi, who is also president and chief executive of Qatar Energy, a state-owned oil and gas company, said of the Russia-Ukraine issue.
In a separate interview with the German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ), Al-Kaabi claimed that Europe’s dependency on Russian gas would take years to lessen and that such a move would require meticulous preparation and years to achieve.
He was speaking only days after German Economy Minister Robert Habeck visited Qatar to seek LNG supplies in an effort to reduce Germany’s reliance on Russia, the country’s major gas supplier.
While no long-term energy collaboration had been agreed upon with Germany, Al-Kaabi told FAZ that there is a “clear intent” to do business. Germany had earlier announced the formation of a cooperation with Qatar.
