Europe is "well prepared", thanks to storage capacities and energy conservation measures, if Russia decides to completely cut off gas supplies.

That's what a top EU leader said amid an intensified energy battle between Russia and the West over the war in Ukraine.

"We are well prepared to resist the extreme use of gas weapons by Russia.

We are not afraid of Russian President Vladimir Putin's decisions, we are asking the Russians to respect the contracts, but if they don't, we are ready to react," EU Economic Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni told reporters. during an economic forum in Italy.

Gentiloni's comments follow Moscow's decision on Friday to delay the reopening of its main gas pipeline linking Russia to Germany.

Russia, through this decision, is reacting to the agreement of the group of seven most industrialized countries of the world to limit the price of Russian oil exports with the aim of reducing Moscow's profits.

He said that gas storage centers in the European Union "are currently filled at a level of around 80 percent, thanks to the policies of expanding energy resources", although the situation differs from country to country.

Russian energy giant Gazprom said it could not resume natural gas supplies to Germany, just hours before it was due to resume supplies through the Nord Stream I pipeline.

Russia said the reason for the outage was a technical fault in the pipeline, which is likely to worsen Europe's energy crisis.

The spokesperson of the European Commission, Eric Mamer, wrote on Twitter on Friday that the decision of the Gazprom company to close the gas pipeline was based on "untrue assumptions".

Turbine maker Siemens Energy said Friday there was no technical reason to stop shipping natural gas.

Moscow has blamed Western sanctions imposed after Russia's attack on Ukraine for hampering efforts to maintain the gas pipeline.

Europe accuses Russia of using the gas supply as a method of retaliation against European sanctions.

On Friday, the finance ministers of the G-7 countries said they would work quickly to put a ceiling on the price of Russian oil exports.

Ministers from Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States said this would be "based on a range of technical data".

"This price cap on Russian oil exports is aimed at reducing Putin's income, closing off an important source of funding for aggression (in Ukraine)," German Finance Minister Christian Lindner said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy welcomed the decision of the finance ministers of the G7 countries.

"When this mechanism is implemented, it will become an important element of protecting civilized countries and energy markets from Russian hybrid aggression," Zelenskyy said.

The standoff over the energy supply comes as Russian and Ukrainian forces are attacking each other near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, where UN inspectors are trying to avert a potential nuclear disaster.

/VoA/