Welcome to Hard Talk on the BBC World Service with me, Stephen Sacker.

My guest today is one of the most influential analysts and interpreters of the international energy market.

Turkish-born Fatih Birol was trained as an engineer, specialised in the oil business,

spent years in Vienna working for OPEC, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries,

and is now based in Paris as head of the International Energy Agency. Despite his fossil fuel background,

he wants the IEA to be at the forefront of a global effort to deliver a climate change induced energy transition,

away from fossil fuels and to a sustainable mix of renewable clean energy sources. So how's that going?

Well, right now, the world is preoccupied not with long-term energy transition, but with a short-term spike in prices of

key resources. Could the current energy panic derail plans to decarbonize the global economy?

While Fatty Berol joins me on the line from Paris now, welcome to Hard Talk.

Thank you very much. Thank you very much.

Let me start, if I may, Mr. Beryl, with words of yours not long ago. You said what the

world is going through today is a major. It might be the first global energy crisis in terms of depth

and complexity. With words like that, aren't you in danger of turning an energy problem into an energy panic?

I don't think so. What I am trying to do is that people understand the dimensions of the crisis we are in and to take corresponding measures. If we are not able

to read the game how deep and how complex our global energy crisis is, then we might not

be able to get the right solutions and give the right answers.

For example, when we look at Europe, we have seen the 24th of February, the invasion of Russia

and the International Energy Agency, just one week after 1st of March, we came up with a 10-point plan how to reduce Russia's reliance, Europe's reliance on Russia. Yeah, and how much of the responsibility for this crisis that you identify, how much lies with the Russia-Ukraine war?

Because I'm mindful that prices were spiking, gas, oil prices were spiking even before that invasion.

Yeah, we were already seeing some high gas prices.

And this was also mainly due to the Russia's strategic behavior.

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