Three people died and one was injured in an explosion on the Urengoi-Pomari-Uzhhorod gas pipeline connecting Russia and Ukraine, Reuters and TASS reported.

The Regional Ministry of Emergencies in the Russian Chuvash Republic, where the accident took place, in the region of the city of Kazan, located on the Volga River, reported that the department received a report of a fire along the gas pipeline that occurred during the explosion.

"An explosion occurred on the Urengoi-Pomari-Uzhgorod main gas pipeline. Before the fire, activities were carried out at the facility by the company operator Zavolzhka linear management of the main gas pipelines Gazprom transgaz Nizhny Novgorod", the message says.

An explosion in a gas pipeline from Russia to Ukraine

According to the ministry, it is an underground gas pipeline from which gas leaked, which then ignited.

The accident occurred during scheduled repairs.

According to initial information, there is one injured.

There were no casualties.

The fire has been extinguished, the authorities added.

Gas supply along this section of the pipeline has been stopped.

The gas pipeline that carries gas from the Russian part of the Arctic to Europe was built in the 1980s.

It enters Ukraine through the Suja gas measuring station, a route that is currently the main route for the supply of Russian gas to Europe, notes BTA.

Russia's Gazprom has not yet responded to Reuters' requests for comment.

Earlier today, it said it intended to deliver 43 million cubic meters of gas to Europe via Suja within the next 24 hours, a volume that is in the range of the quantities delivered in recent days.