Moscow, Mar 23 (IANS): Russia will now accept payment for gas exports to "unfriendly countries" in rubles only, President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting with the government on Wednesday.

The Russian President explained that Russia plans to abandon all "compromised" currencies in payment settlements, RT reported.

He added that illegitimate decisions by a number of Western countries to freeze Russia's assets destroyed all confidence in their currencies.

"I have decided to implement in the shortest possible time a set of measures to change the payments for - yes let's start with this - for our natural gas supplied to the so-called unfriendly countries in Russian rubles, that is to stop using all compromised currencies for transactions," the Russian President said.

Putin gave the Central Bank and the government a week to determine the procedure for operations for buying rubles on the domestic market for importers of Russian gas.

The President added that Russia will continue to supply gas in accordance with the volumes and pricing principles of the contracts. Only the currency of payment will change, the report said.