“Against stupidity, the Gods themselves contend in vain.” — Schiller
So Serbia’s government has agreed to sell its oil and gas company, NIS, to Russia’s Gazprom.
By itself there’s nothing wrong with this. What’s stupid about it is the price. NIS has a market value of around $2.8 billion. The government is selling it [...]

Well just in case the Iranian situation wasn’t difficult enough in and of itself (or here), there are always some around who will seek to take short-term benefit from the temporary embarassment of others. So this week, as June delivery oil prices spiked up around the 74 dollar a barrel mark, it became just [...]

Well the new EU energy plan has been released (and here, and you can also find the actual Commission statement here). The final product is pretty much as the leaks suggested.
As was indicated yesterday, Russia related concerns are central. The FT comments:
Russia supplies a quarter of Europe’s gas needs and the Union’s dependence [...]

Expanding on (and slightly copying) my comments in Edward’s post below, I was really shocked to see the spin in the western coverage of the Ukrainian gas crisis. The part that didn’t shock me - just made me groan - is the spin of a western press that seems to have decided in advance [...]

If there’s one mystery trumping all the others in the recent Russian-Ukrainian gas supply row, it is the one concerning the role and intentions of the Kremlin, particularly with respect to Vladimir Putin: Why fight a public battle over an issue that is almost as intransparent and complicated as the geological processes that created the [...]

It was the late AJP Taylor who suggested that the efficient (or proximate) cause of the first world war was to be found in the the way the national railway timetables had been drawn up. Without wishing to take issue with Taylor (either for or against), it does occur to me that a certain amount [...]

EU unilaterally blocking Russia’s entry into the very very multilateral WTO.
How many poles is this multipolar thing going to have, anyway?
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Putin Doesn’t Like EU Terms for Entry
October 9, 2003
By Natalya Shurmina
YEKATERINBURG, Russia (Reuters) - President Vladimir Putin sharply
criticized European Union “bureaucrats” on Thursday for pressing the
country to raise domestic energy prices as a condition [...]