Ukraine has officially ceased the transportation of Russian natural gas through its pipelines, marking the end of a prewar transit agreement that expired on December 31, 2024. This decision was announced by Ukraine’s Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko, who cited national security as the primary reason.

“This is a historic event,” Halushchenko stated on the Telegram messaging app Wednesday morning. “Russia is losing markets and will incur financial losses. Europe has already decided to phase out Russian gas, and [this] aligns with what Ukraine has done today,” he added, according to a translation by the Associated Press.

The decision has significant implications for Russia’s state-controlled energy giant Gazprom. In a statement, Gazprom said that Ukraine’s refusal to extend the transit deal leaves it with “no technical or legal possibility” to continue transporting gas through the country. The transit officially stopped at 8 a.m. Moscow time, according to the company.

Before the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, gas supplies from Russia flowed through Ukraine under a five-year agreement signed when the two countries were still part of the Soviet Union. Despite the war, this arrangement allowed Ukraine to collect transit fees while Gazprom continued to profit from its European markets.

However, the landscape of European energy reliance has drastically changed. Before the conflict, nearly 40% of the European Union’s pipeline natural gas came from Russia. After the war began, Russia reduced supplies through other pipelines, triggering an energy crisis across Europe. In response, the EU accelerated efforts to cut its dependence on Russian energy and has committed to eliminating Russian gas imports entirely by 2027.

This move by Ukraine symbolizes a significant shift in the region’s energy dynamics and further isolates Russia from European markets. It also underscores Europe’s determination to find alternative energy sources amid escalating geopolitical tensions.