Russia to cut gas to Finland Saturday, Finnish energy company reports

Russian supply of natural gas to Finland will be cut on Saturday morning, Finnish state-owned energy company Gasum said Friday, after the Nordic country refused to pay supplier Gazprom in rubles.

"It is highly regrettable that natural gas supplies under our supply contract will now be halted," Gasum CEO Mika Wiljanen said in a statement.

However, we have been carefully preparing for this situation" and "there will be no disruptions in the gas transmission network," Wiljanen said.

The supply contract will end on Saturday at 7:00 am (0400 GMT), Gasum said.

In April, Gazprom Export demanded that future payments in the supply contract be made in rubles instead of euros, but Gasum rejected the demand and announced on Tuesday it was taking the issue to arbitration.

Queried about the matter, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov on Friday referred reporters to Gazprom for "details" but said that "it is obvious that nobody is going to deliver anything for free." 

Natural gas accounts for about eight per cent of Finland's energy consumption, most of which comes from Russia.

In efforts to mitigate the risks of relying on Russian energy exports, the Finnish government earlier on Friday...