Fightin' Words; Fight's On -- June 1, 2016

Earlier we updated the LNG / Poland story. Today, Bloomberg has more:

Poland will struggle to replace all the natural gas it gets from Russia’s Gazprom PJSC, including with U.S. supplies, as it bids to lower dependence on its eastern neighbor, according to the Moscow-based company.

“Of course, everybody is free to choose how to purchase his gas and to ensure the competitiveness of his economy," Gazprom Deputy Chief Executive Officer Alexander Medvedev told reporters in Moscow Tuesday. “There is a well-known fairy-tale about an old woman who asked a golden fish to turn her into a Sea Empress but in the end she found herself back with her broken washtub in front of her," he said, referring to a story by Alexander Pushkin.

Poland, which relies on Russian gas for two-thirds of its needs, has sought lower prices from Gazprom amid political tensions between the nations over President Vladimir Putin’s policies in eastern Europe. The European Union nation will get its first shipments of liquefied natural gas from Qatar and Norway into a new terminal next month, and has proposed doubling its capacity and building a pipeline to Norway to completely cut its reliance on Russia.

Poland was Gazprom’s fifth-biggest EU customer last year, buying about 9 billion cubic meters (320 billion cubic feet) worth more than $2 billion. It is one of the most vocal opponents of a push by Putin to expand a natural gas link to Europe that circumvents Ukraine.