“The current situation in the relations with Ukraine in the gas sector is as follows: taking into consideration the holidays, the USD 1.5 billion payment made by Naftogaz Ukrainy will be received by us only on January 11. This will settle the overdue penalties and part of the debt for gas supplies. The remaining debt for gas will be in this case USD 614million.

The contract for this year hasn’t been signed yet. Naftogaz Ukrainy has withdrawn from the talks, the negotiating group is in Kiev and so far hasn’t expressed its readiness to arrive in Moscow. Due to the absence of a contract for gas deliveries to Ukraine, gas isn’t being supplied. Deliveries intended for transit to European consumers are being effectuated in accordance with the existing requests.

As you know, the Naftogaz Ukrainy management has officially and publicly declared that it withdraws 21 million cubic meters of gas daily from the transit volumes. We have also received relevant documents confirming that 21 million cubic meters of gas are siphoned off in the transit routes for technological needs. In view of this, we are boosting gas deliveries via other transit directions, such as Belarus, for instance.

Today’s top news is as follows: the Ukrainian side hasn’t agreed to the gas transit volume required by us for the next twenty-four hours. Our request for 303 million cubic meters was rebuffed and approved for only 296 million cubic meters. At the same time, as you know, the independent observers from SGS are still not admitted to gas metering stations in Ukraine,” said OAO Gazprom official spokesman Sergey Kupriyanov.