By Staff, Agencies German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has refused to immediately cut energy ties with Russia, in a move that threatens to undermine the West's sanctions on Moscow. Germany relies on Russia to supply around 40 percent of its gas supplies.

Scholz vowed for Europe to end its energy dependency on Russia, but refused to do so now.

He said to do so "overnight" would plunge his country into a recession, risking hundreds of thousands of jobs and entire industrial sectors.

He further added: “Sanctions should not hurt European states harder than the Russian leadership.” It comes ahead of an EU summit on Thursday where the bloc is expected to agree on a new sanctions package.

But ministers have already clashed on how to respond.

The EU and allies have already imposed hefty measures against Russia, including freezing its central bank's assets.

But targeting Russian energy exports, as the United States and Britain have done, is a divisive choice for the 27-nation EU German Vice-Chancellor Robert Habeck said on public radio DLF on March 19 that completely slashing Russian energy imports could mean a “three percent to five percent loss of GDP”, which would lead to “some people no longer earning any money at all.” He added: “And these some people are very, very many.”