RUSSIAN GAS was still not flowing across Ukraine last night, as the countries accused each other of sabotaging efforts to restart supply to the European Union.
Problems emerged soon after Russia’s Gazprom pumped gas into one pipeline yesterday morning, a move that the EU hoped would mark the end of a crisis that has deprived hundreds of thousands of Balkan homes of heat and forced industry across eastern Europe to scale back or halt production.
“Ukraine didn’t open any export pipelines,” claimed senior Gazprom official Alexander Medvedev. “They just shut down the entry of the pipeline in the direction of the Balkans. We don’t have the physical opportunity to pump the gas to European customers.”
Ukraine blamed Gazprom for pumping the gas with too little pressure, and for using a pipeline through which gas could not be exported without Ukrainian customers being disconnected.
“This is one of the methods used in the fight against our independence and sovereignty. This attack against Ukraine is intended to cause a revolt in eastern regions,” said President Viktor Yushchenko, referring to largely ethnic-Russian areas of Ukraine where heavy industry relies on gas and discontent with his administration is strong.
He also said Russia wanted to take control of Ukraine’s pipeline system, through which the EU receives around one-fifth of its gas, and suggested that his country pay Gazprom $205-210 per 1,000 cubic metres of gas in 2009 – less than half the amount previously demanded by the Kremlin-controlled firm.
International monitors at gas facilities in Russia and Ukraine did not immediately apportion blame for yesterday’s problems.
The dispute was triggered by Russia’s claim that Kiev still owes money for last year’s gas, and came against a backdrop of icy relations between the neighbours, who have been at odds since Ukraine’s 2004 Orange Revolution ushered in leaders who court the US, the EU and Nato and deride Moscow’s influence.
Mr Medvedev admitted that he was referring to Washington yesterday when he said Kiev’s behaviour during the crisis suggested it was “dancing to music that is not orchestrated in Ukraine”.
Many people in Russia believe Ukraine and Washington see the dispute as a chance to discredit Moscow and push the EU into developing new energy sources and supply routes.
Kiev and some energy analysts, however, think the Kremlin is trying to promote its own plans for the Nord Stream pipeline through the Baltic Sea to Germany, and South Stream across the Black Sea to the Balkans. Both would bypass nations with which Russia has prickly relations, like Ukraine, Poland and the Baltic states.
“Perhaps today the technical state of Ukraine’s gas transport system is such that it cannot pump,” suggested Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin last night, to which Mr Yushchenko retorted that Ukraine’s pipeline network was “twice as good as the Russian system, and almost as reliable as...Europe’s”. The prime ministers of Bulgaria and Slovakia, two of the states worst affected by the crisis, plan to visit Kiev and Moscow today for talks.