Austrian Defense Minister Klaudia Tanner said Tuesday that the Austrian government is preparing «intensively» for a possible blackout as a result of the war in Ukraine, launched on February 24 on the orders of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
For the defense minister, the probability of a blackout in some parts of the European Union in the near future is very high. «The question is not if it will come, it is when it will come,» he remarked in an interview with the newspaper ‘Welt’.
In this sense, he has assured that the risk of a generalized blackout has increased significantly as a result of the war.
«For Putin, hacker attacks on the Western energy supply are a means of hybrid warfare. We should not pretend that this is just theory. We have to prepare for blackouts in Austria and in Europe,» he said.
Thus, he has assured that «one third of the population would no longer be able to fend for itself on the fourth day of a blackout at the latest». For this reason, he informed that his Executive is practicing «blackout crisis operations on a regular basis».
«By 2025 we will invest a total of 180 million euros in the expansion of 100 so-called self-sufficient barracks, which will have energy supply and will be able to fend for themselves for at least two weeks,» Tanner explained.
TANNER URGES WEST TO INITIATE PEACE The minister noted that she is not sure «if there will ever be a winner» in the Ukrainian war, claiming that Russian troops have «huge reserves of material and soldiers.»
«Fortunately, Ukraine has made very important achievements, but it has a huge territory to defend,» she has indicated, urging the international community to take part in peace negotiations.
Tanner has asserted that «it is important that there are talks in the background and that the focus is increasingly on Diplomacy.» «You can also see that the West, which has been supporting Ukraine for months with military and financial aid, must work with Kiev to find out when the limit of this war will be reached and when it makes sense to start negotiations in a proper format,» he has criticized.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
