"Europe Threatens Gazprom With Antitrust Action"

"The European Union’s top antitrust enforcer on Thursday threatened to formally charge the Russian natural gas giant Gazprom with restricting trade and price gouging, raising the stakes in a two-year investigation that has already created tensions with Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin."

"An antitrust action would be risky, given Europe’s dependence on Gazprom for about a quarter of all natural gas consumed in the European Union, and given the Russian company’s history of cutting off customers for perceived political affronts. Gazprom, for instance, stopped providing fuel to Ukraine in midwinter 'gas wars' in 2006 and 2009."

James Kanter and Andrew E. Kramer report for the New York Times October 3, 2013.