Tensions are rising in the northern region of the Black Sea, due to Russia's military activities on the border with Ukraine and the increase of weapons shipments by western countries, especially the USA, to support Ukraine.
Europe imports about 40 percent of natural gas from Russia, which corresponds to 175 billion cubic meters of natural gas.
Russia mainly exports its gas to the continent via the Yamal-Europe pipeline passing through Belarus and Poland, and the Nord Stream pipelines, which carry it via Ukraine to the Baltic Sea region.
The possibility of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, European sanctions against Russian gas and the possibility of Russia stopping the flow of gas to Europe raise new concerns about energy security in the continent at a time when the region is witnessing a serious crisis in the energy field.
Strong relations between Algeria and Moscow
It is known that Algerian-Russian relations have been strong both diplomatically and militarily since Algeria gained independence in 1962.
Moscow is considered the first arms supplier to Algeria. According to observers, purchases of "Sukhoi" and "MiG" aircraft, aircraft to be used to transport soldiers, helicopters and tanks, as well as 6 submarines and advanced air defense systems amounted to billions of dollars in recent years.
Algeria and Russia signed a strategic partnership agreement in 2001 for cooperation in many fields such as military, commercial and energy. Sonatrach, the national oil company of Algeria, also has close relations with Russian energy companies such as Gazprom and Lukoil.
Gas supply from the Algerian desert to Europe
Algeria is connected to continental Europe by three pipelines to transport gas from the large Hassi R'Mel field in the south of the country and elsewhere; one of them was discontinued months ago, but two pipelines are still in service.
The first line, which was put into service in 1984, connects Algeria to Italy (the island of Sicily) via Tunisia and has an annual capacity of 30 billion cubic meters.
The second pipeline runs from Beni Saf town in northwest Algeria to Almeria city in southern Spain. The annual capacity of the line known as "Medgaz" is 8 billion cubic meters. Expansion work continues to increase the capacity to 10.6 billion cubic meters.
The third line, which stopped at the beginning of last November, is the Maghreb-Europe gas pipeline connecting Algeria to Spain, passing through Morocco and the Mediterranean.
The Algerian Presidency announced on October 31st that the contract of the pipeline, which passed through Morocco, with which it has recently terminated diplomatic relations, will not be renewed.
Following Russia in the second place with a rate of up to 30 percent in some years in terms of supplying gas to Italy, Algeria ranks first in supplying gas to Spain and Portugal, which have a market share of nearly 50 percent. It also supplies liquefied natural gas to France, Greece and Turkey.
Algeria produced around 130 billion cubic meters of natural gas last year and exported more than 45 billion cubic meters of that.
Algeria not enough to meet Russia's possible gas flow interruption
One of the former CEOs of Sonatrach stated that Algeria cannot replace Russian gas for a simple reason such as the production difference between the two countries.
The former official said Algeria exports the most to Italy in 20 to 30 billion cubic meters, Portugal and Spain about 12 billion cubic meters and smaller quantities to France, Turkey, Greece and some other countries. He noted that the amount of gas it delivers has exceeded 42 billion cubic meters, and that only a Russian pipeline can pump this amount.
"Obviously there is no country that can resist Russia's gas production at the moment. There are attempts by Europe to reduce its dependence on Russian gas through other sources such as Algeria, Qatar and the United States," said the former CEO. said.
When asked whether Algeria would risk its relations with Russia to fill a potential gas supply gap to Europe, Hüseyin Bukara, Professor of Political Science and International Relations, said that his country always acted pragmatically in economic matters and put political calculations aside.
Bukara, who previously worked at the University of Algiers, said, "As its production will not be enough to meet the Russian supply, Algeria cannot replace Russian natural gas. Russian pipelines supplying gas to Europe make shipments from Russian gas fields, which have a higher production capacity compared to Algeria." said.
Considering the possibility of the crisis between the West and Russia turning into a military confrontation point as a remote possibility, Bukara noted that for this reason, it is impossible to cut Russian supplies to Europe.
Bukara pointed out that Europe is aware of the dire consequences of an armed conflict with Moscow.
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