Russia Wants to Protect the Planet and Gazprom at Climate Summit

Russia will seek sanctions relief on green investment projects for state-run energy giants such as Gazprom at next month’s COP26 climate summit, as it comes under growing pressure to join a commitment to slash methane emissions.

“We are being urged to reduce methane leakages and yet we have Gazprom under sanctions,” Russian President Vladimir Putin’s climate envoy, Ruslan Edelgeriyev, said in an interview Wednesday at the annual Valdai Club meeting in Sochi. “Let’s take climate projects out of sanctions, so that Gazprom has access to green financing, access to technologies.”

Amid surging Covid-19 infections at home, Putin has opted ...