Last checked at 
(Adds gas prices, gas exports data)
By Vladimir Soldatkin
MOSCOW, Dec 7 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin
has ordered the government to work out proposals by March 1 for
energy giant Rosneft to supply 10 billion cubic metres
of natural gas exports to Europe, Interfax news agency reported
on Tuesday.
Rosneft, Russia's largest oil producer, in which BP
owns an almost 20% stake, has long sought to make inroads into
the lucrative natural gas market in Europe, which its Chief
Executive Igor Sechin has said should help to ease pressure on
gas prices.
Some politicians and experts have accused Russia, a key
supplier of gas to Europe, of withholding deliveries of gas amid
delays in the certification of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, as
gas prices have soared amid tight supplies and rising demand.
Kremlin-controlled Gazprom, which holds monopoly
right for gas exports via pipelines, sends it to Europe via a
number of routes.
Two of these, via Ukraine and the Yamal pipeline, are
underused, and if Rosneft secures export rights it may help to
ease pressure on the European gas market.
Moscow has said it is meeting all its contractual
obligations, something which its key buyers have confirmed.
Commodity prices were buoyed on Tuesday by easing concerns
over the impact of the Omicron coronavirus variant on global
fuel demand.
The Dutch day-ahead contract rose 7.43 euros to
95.00 euros per megawatt hour (MWh) in the morning, while the
benchmark Dutch front-month contract was up 5.50
euros, also at 95.00 euros/MWh.
Russian gas flows through the Yamal-Europe pipeline into
Germany at the Mallnow metering point on the Polish border were
at an hourly volume of more than 10 million kilowatt hours (kWh)
on Tuesday, broadly unchanged for the past two days.
Nominations for Tuesday's volumes at the Velke Kapusany
metering point on the Slovakia-Ukraine border, another major
route to Europe, were for 951,580.2 MWh or 87.5 million cubic
metres, similar to levels seen from the end of last week.
(Reporting by Anton Kolodyazhnyy; Writing by Vladimir
Soldatkin; Editing by Kirsten Donovan, Katya Golubkova and Jan
Harvey)
