The parliamentary faction of the European Solidarity party led by former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko is drafting a Verkhovna Rada resolution banning direct purchases of natural gas from Russia, Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, a parliamentarian and head of the Rada committee on Ukraine’s integration with the European Union, said on Nov. 29.
“It is important for us, for European Solidarity, to help the government as much as we can to resist Russia’s pressure and not to allow the resumption of direct gas deliveries from Russia. Therefore, we will initiate a Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada resolution. We hope the parliamentarians will support us and we will be able to warn the Ukrainian executive branch against resuming these direct shipments in exchange for mythical discounts from Russia,” the party’s press service quoted Klympush-Tsintsadze as saying.
Klympush-Tsintsadze said Russian sources had claimed that bilateral gas talks were under way. The Ukrainian Energy and Environment Protection Ministry explained that the talks concerned gas transport across Ukraine.
“We have a trilateral format that we have agreed upon with the European Union – between the EU, Ukraine and Russia – in which negotiations on concluding a long-term contract with Russia have been held for nearly a year. And Ukraine and the EU show a united front in these negotiations,” she said.
Klympush-Tsintsadze also stressed that Ukraine does not need Russian gas to pass through the heating season, as Ukraine has pumped over 21.5 billion cubic meters of gas into its underground gas storage facilities, which is enough to provide for Ukraine’s demand for gas for a much longer period than the heating season.
