Ukraine is ready to resume purchases of natural gas from Russia if it is cheap and if the signing of respective contracts is transparent, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has said.
“What has happened in the past two years? We are energy independent. They (Russia) are knocking: can you take our gas? No, everything is fine in our country. If it’s cheap and fair, not corrupt, then please,” he said during his working trip to Odessa.
Poroshenko said that if the abovementioned conditions were met, the Ukrainian authorities were ready to take such a step “in order to reduce tariffs for our people.”
Explaining the presence among the demands of the Ukrainian side of the absence of a corruption component in a possible contract for natural gas supplies from Russia, the president noted that “for 20 years Ukraine has been dependent on Russian gas”. And only through decisive actions, including in international courts, Ukraine managed to ensure energy independence and fair gas prices, he said.
Poroshenko recalled that Naftogaz Ukrainy had recently won a lawsuit against Russia’s Gazprom at the Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce. (Interfax-Ukraine/Business World Magazine)
