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’s Economy Minister Robert Habeck touched down in on Saturday, in search of new ways to meet his country’s energy needs in the light of sanctions on Russia over its��invasion of Ukraine.��

Habeck was visiting Qatar on the back of another trip to , and plans to discuss future supplies of Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) from the resource-rich gulf state.��

Following his visit to Doha the minister will be tracing Boris Johnson’s footsteps to the United Arab Emirates, who are positioning themselves as leading producers of green hydrogen.��

Germany has felt the effect of Europe’s sweeping sanctions against Russia particularly keenly, and was forced to halt the development of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline - which would have deepened Europe’s energy dependence on Russia for the foreseeable future.��

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Because of Germany’s focus on pipeline gas, pivoting to LNG imports from countries such as Qatar and the UAE would have to be gradual, to allow for necessary infrastructure improvements.��

In comments earlier this week during an interview Deutschlandfunk radio, Habeck said that Germany was "stupid"��to let itself become dependent on Russia for around half of its gas supplies.

The minister pledged that in future, individual sources should be limited to providing between 10 and 20% of the country’s energy needs.��

However, in a following interview with Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung that week, he defended making energy deals with countries with “problematic” human rights records - comparing them favourably with Russia’s current position.��

The Russian economy is heavily reliant on energy exports for stability - making up between 50 - 60 percent��of Gross National Product.��