STORY: The special meeting of European energy ministers on Friday, Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck in conversation with his Czech colleague Jozef Sikela. Discussions were held here in Brussels for five hours. The EU Commission is now to draw up a concrete plan within a few days to get the skyrocketing energy prices under control. The preferred way is to change the rules on the electricity market, i.e. to break the link between electricity and gas prices, said Habeck. “In such a way that the cheap energies, especially the cheap renewable energies with their price effect, also reach the consumers without destroying the market mechanisms. Because we need functioning markets, otherwise there would be no more instruments for securing the energy supply There are proposals for that. I would say that they are already very advanced proposals, also from Germany.” “We are doing something here that affects the heart of Europe’s energy supply, namely: We intervene in the markets, a system that has been built up over years, decades will now be changed in a few weeks or months. Those are the times, man must not shy away from it. But of course we have to know very well what we are doing there.” There was no majority for the plans to introduce a price cap on Russian gas. This would lead to an immediate halt to Russian energy supplies. However, some Eastern European countries are almost completely dependent on Russia and are therefore now more cautious. “I stood here several times and asked at the beginning of the Russian attack to consider the special situation in Germany, so not to force us now to impose a gas embargo in March, because we as an economy would not stand it. That was us granted.” “I would like to approach the other countries with the same caution.” “And how presumptuous it would be to say: Germany always asks for leniency, but the other countries don’t get any.” The traffic light coalition had announced an electricity price brake at the weekend and preferred a European agreement. If this does not succeed quickly, a national solution should take effect, the details of which are still unclear.