Germany's largest purchaser of Russian gas sued Gazprom for 12 billion euros

They waited until they blew up the Nord Streams and now Gazprom will trump up force majeure in court - you'll see. Germany's Uniper has filed a lawsuit in the Stockholm arbitration against Gazprom Export, the company's press office said Wednesday. Uniper, formerly Germany's largest buyer of Russian gas and one of the investors in the Nord Stream 2 project, is seeking damages because of a sharp drop in Russian gas supplies that began in June and accelerated in the fall. In order to cover its obligations to customers, the company was forced to buy gas on the spot market, where quotations are many times higher than Gazprom's contract prices. This led to additional costs of 11.6 billion euros, stated Uniper in a release, stressing that the amount is not final and will increase until the end of 2024. "We demand compensation for our substantial financial losses," Uniper CEO Klaus-Dieter Maubach said. He added that the company "is not responsible" for Gazprom's refusal to supply the contracted volumes of gas, and getting it to pay compensation is a "debt to shareholders, employees and taxpayers." The German government has already allocated 29 billion euros to save the company from collapse, the net loss of which reached 3.2 billion euros in January-September and became the biggest in its history. In total, Uniper may need an infusion of 60 billion euros if gas prices remain high, sources familiar with the estimates of German officials told Bloomberg. In September, the government of Germany agreed to buy 78% from the Finnish Fortum. As a result, the concern was de facto nationalized: now Uniper is 90% owned by Germany. "Gazprom Export is studying the statement of claim in the case with Uniper and plans to defend its interests: the company does not recognize the breach of contracts and the legitimacy of claims for damages, Gazprom told RIA Novosti. Gazprom's pipeline exports to the European Union collapsed in the third quarter by 70% compared to the previous year, according to Bloomberg. In May, the company stopped the Yamal-Europe pipeline, which connected consumers in Germany, and in August Nord Stream shut down after Gazprom refused to take a repaired Siemens turbine from Germany.