Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Azarov has said that former Ukrainian Prime Minister and Batkivschyna Party leader Yulia Tymoshenko is now being tried for falsifying government directives for the country's gas talks with Russia.
"Understanding quite well that the government would have never approved these directives, she [Tymoshenko] created fake "directives of the Ukrainian government’ and submitted them for signature by [ex-CEO of Naftogaz Ukrainy Oleh] Dubyna," he told the students of the Taras Shevchenko National University in Kyiv on Thursday.
Azarov said that the terms of gas contracts that Tymoshenko submitted to the then Ukrainian government were so obviously disadvantageous to Ukraine that the government refused to approve the directives for signing the contracts.
He noted that before the conclusion of gas contracts in 2009, there had been an agreement with Russia that the sides would annually draft an additional agreement to determine the amount of gas supplies, the cost of gas transit, and the gas price.
"As a result of the signing of the agreement by Tymoshenko, over the next ten years, Ukraine undertook to purchase approximately 40 billion cubic meters of gas annually. And if it suddenly does not buy gas, then it still must pay for this amount and pay penalties – 150% of the cost of gas for under-consumption in summer and up to 300% for under-consumption in winter," Azarov said.
He said that the contracts are absolutely disadvantageous and unfair for Ukraine and that they should be reviewed.
Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office accused Tymoshenko of abusing her official powers when the gas contracts with Russia were being negotiated in 2009, which caused the sate budget to lose over UAH 1.5 billion.
The court hearings of the gas case started on June 24. Tymoshenko was arrested on August 5 on counts of "obstructing efforts to establish the truth," according to the prosecutors.
