"Nobody ever said anything about whether rubles payments breach sanctions or not, how these payments are organized. So it’s such a gray zone here.”

Actually, it's not a gray zone at all: on April 27, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen specifically warned companies not to bend to Russia’s demands to pay for gas in rubles: "companies with such contracts should not accede to the Russian demands,” von der Leyen said. “This would be a breach of the sanctions so a high risk for the companies.”